Apple Launches MacBook Bottom Case Replacement Program

As noted by MacTalk [via setteB.it], a support document last updated on May 26 details Apple’s new “MacBook Bottom Case Replacement Program” which, for MacBooks shipped between October 2009 and April 2011, grants owners of white MacBooks with peeling rubber cases a free replacement of the entire case both in and out of warranty.

Apple has determined that under certain circumstances the rubber surface on some MacBooks may separate from the bottom case of the system. MacBooks shipped between October 2009 and April 2011 may experience this issue.

Apple will replace the bottom case of any affected MacBook, free of charge, that exhibits the issue.

Apple offers three options to replace the bottom case for free: owners can visit an Apple Store by setting up an appointment at the Genius Bar to get the replacement; alternatively, Apple Authorized Resellers can also replace the MacBook’s case. For those not willing to visit an Apple Store or reseller, Apple is offering a free replacement kit online (which includes “a new bottom case, screws, a Phillips head screwdriver, and instructions”) provided you live in one of the 22 supported countries (though the program is presented as “worldwide”) and you have access to your MacBook’s serial number. More details can be found on the program’s official page.

The white MacBook is due an update and several rumors claimed Apple was looking to discontinue it to make room for the popular MacBook Airs as the default entry line. The white MacBooks were also affected by other hardware issues in the past, such as discoloration problems and cracked cases.

Opera Mini 6 for iPad Reviewed

There isn’t any stiff competition on the iPad when it comes to third party browsers, but one could arguably assert that Opera has a widely recognizable name when it comes to the mobile browser space; we’re sure the Opera community would enjoy additional exposure on iOS alongside the dominant focus on Android. Unfortunately, Opera’s attention to Android has tended to be a problem when it comes to curating its iOS app. When Opera for the iPhone launched to the surprise of many in 2010, the app fell by the wayside with a lack of enthusiasm and was seemingly forgotten about as Opera for the iPhone never updated to take advantage of the Retina Display. Opera had seemingly lost interest in supporting iOS, that is until an updated Opera Mini 6 landed on the App Store as a universal app, bringing an updated interface and some extra polish to their mobile app. It remains to be seen whether Opera will continue to provide consistent updates to their mobile browser on iOS, but that doesn’t mean we won’t provide our take on the current “red O”.

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Instamap for iPad Lets You Browse Instagram Photos By Location, Tags

Ever since the release of Instagallery in March, there haven’t been many Instagram clients coming to the iPad. Whilst the platform has seen an explosion of iPhone-connected applications, Mac and web tools aimed at enhancing the regular Instragram experience with features like postcard printing and screensavers, the iPad feels like it’s been left behind in the race to shipping the ultimate third-party Instagram app to browse photo streams with the comfort of a 9.7-inch screen. Instamap, a new app by NextRoot, is probably the nicest and simplest use of Instagram’s API that I’ve seen on the iPad so far. Available at $1.99 on the App Store, Instamap doesn’t let you upload photos but it’s got some clever maps-related features that you can use to browse photos by location – say you want to see Instagram pictures shot in Paris, just enter “Paris, France” in the search box and hit Go. Instamap will display a new photo stack on a map (If you choose map view) or a simple (animated) grid of photos for you to tap around, like, and comment. Similarly, in the same “subscriptions” section in the sidebar, Instamap enables you to enter a tag to browse photos associated to a specific keyword, useful if you’d like to see photos sorted by context rather than location. These subscriptions can be deleted and refreshed at any time – the grid design is beautiful and the animations pretty neat.

All the way down in the sidebar, Instamap also gives you access to your stream and currently popular photos on the service. While I generally avoid the Popular tab because I don’t care about vintage kitten photos and other people’s meals, the possibility to check out my feed within Instamap is really welcome. It would be even better with native uploads. I also would like to see buttons to load more photos and “shuffle” in a future update.

At $1.99, Instamap is an elegant and lightweight Instagram client that feels good on the iPad and works well in the way it can group photos by tag or location. Get the app here.

Unreal-powered Dream:scape for iOS Coming Next Week

First announced back in April with a promising trailer that showed extensive usage of the Unreal Engine for iOS to depict highly realistic, interactive environments to freely explore, Dream:scape is finally launching next week on June 9th in the App Store. The game, described as an interactive narrative experience, was actually submitted a few weeks ago soon after the first trailer was posted online, but the submission process didn’t go exactly as planned as the app was certified as being capable of running only on the iPhone 4 and iPad 2. The Speed Bump Studios developers then went back to coding, re-engineered the app, and re-submitted. Dream:scape should be coming next Saturday and, according to the developers, it will run on the iPhone 3GS, iPhone 4, iPod touch 4th gen, iPad and iPad 2. As the iPod touch 3rd gen shares hardware similar to 3GS, we assume it will be supported as well.

As for the game itself, the official website offers this description:

Take on the role of Wilson, a coma patient relearning his past by exploring the dreamscape of his memories. Only there, in the lucid light of the subconscious, buried secrets are revealed, unraveling a decades-old mystery of tragedy, betrayal, and ultimately, revenge.

The screenshots and the trailers revealed so far are very intriguing, though little is known about actual gameplay and mechanics that will involve use of iOS multitouch and other features. We’re looking forward to the launch of this next Unreal-based game for iOS, in the meantime you can watch the new trailer below. [via TouchArcade] Read more

Samsung’s Head of Mobile: “We Didn’t Copy Apple’s Design”

In an interview with The Wall Street Journal, Samsung’s chief of mobile division J.K. Shin explained why the company is heavily committed to the Android platform and why, considering the history of mobile devices, the fight with Apple won’t be “legally problematic.” In the ongoing series of lawsuits between Apple – which first sued Samsung back in April claiming the company copied the “look and feel” of the iPhone and iPad with its Galaxy phones and tablets – a document uncovered over the weekend revealed Samsung’s lawyers asked the court to get access to final versions or production units of Apple’s next-generation iPhone and iPad, so they could evaluate whether the products they’re working on could be subject to Apple’s legal action in the future. The bold move came after a judge ruled Apple’s legal department (not engineers or executives) could see Samsung’s upcoming Droid Charge, Galaxy Tab 8.9, Galaxy Tab 10.1, Infuse 4G and Galaxy S 2 – some of them unreleased devices, but teased and unveiled anyway by the company months ago.

The Wall Street Journal reports the following statements:

We didn’t copy Apple’s design,” Mr. Shin said. “We have used many similar designs over the past years and it [Apple’s allegation] will not be legally problematic.” He suggested the scale of the lawsuit could grow, though he didn’t provide more details.

Android is the fastest-growing platform and the market direction is headed toward Android so we’re riding the wave,” added Younghee Lee, senior vice president of sales and marketing. Samsung also aims to differentiate itself from Apple and other tablet makers by continuing to offer various sizes, Mr. Shin said.

Samsung is a key partner in Apple’s production chain for iOS devices, as also confirmed by Apple’s Tim Cook at the Q2 2011 earnings call when directly asked about what effects the lawsuit against Samsung’s mobile division would have on the collaboration between Apple and Samsung’s component business. In fact, whilst LG’s shipments of iPad displays in the first quarter of 2011 reached only 3.2 million units, a report claimed Samsung shipped 4 million iPad displays in the same quarter. It is unclear at this point what Mr. Shin meant by “not legally problematic” referring to a lawsuit that could grow in the coming weeks, though it appears none of the companies is willing to back down until the court decides or a settlement is reached.

TypeTool Chooses The Right Font For Your App, Becomes Powerful With Photoshop Touch SDK

Earlier this month, Adobe updated Photoshop to support the new Photoshop Touch SDK, which allows developers to build mobile apps that tie into and complement the full desktop version of Photoshop. Adobe themselves built three iPad apps that demonstrated the capabilities of the SDK, whilst they are neat we have been waiting to see how other developers would take advantage of the SDK in building innovative mobile apps.

TypeTool from appland is one of the first apps that takes advantage of the SDK. In essence, TypeTool is a simple app that aims to make the life of an iPhone designer or developer that much easier by assisting them in choosing the right font and font size for their app. There are two main features in TypeTool, the first of which is a size chart where you can preview what various fonts look like from sizes of 9pt to 32pt. The second key feature is the Typesetter where you can build up a basic UI, trying different fonts and font sizes to see how they look together.

Where the Photoshop Touch SDK comes in is with the Typesetter, previously TypeTool would let you email yourself the details of what fonts you choose, and a screenshot of what the fonts look like. However you can now opt to directly send your configuration into Photoshop, which will create a document that mirrors what you see on the iPhone with the specific fonts and sizes that you specified. From there you could either build up the rest of the design around the imported text or choose to copy over the text into an existing Photoshop document.

TypeTool is available on the iPhone for $2.99, to export to Photoshop you will need to have version 12.0.4 and be on the same network. The developers are considering building an iPad version as well as adding some more “designer tools” and increasing the usage of the Photoshop Touch SDK within the app.

If you’re you a developer of an iOS app that takes advantage of the Photoshop Touch SDK or know of a really innovative app that does, please let us know! Jump the break for some more screenshots.

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10.6.8 Will Get Mac App Store Ready for Lion, Remove Mac Defender

According to the release notes of the latest build of Mac OS X 10.6.8 seeded to developers on Friday, the upcoming upgrade will contain improvements for Preview, VPN and IPv6, but more importantly it will make changes to the Mac App Store application in order to get it ready for Lion’s digital distribution this summer. As noted by 9to5mac, the installer of build 10K531 reports 10.6.8 will “enhance the Mac App Store to get your Mac ready to upgrade to Mac OS X Lion”, as well as “identify and remove known variants of Mac Defender.” Last week, Apple indeed updated a support document related to the Mac Defender malware promising that “in the coming days” a Mac OS X software update would be released to automatically find and remove Mac Defender and its known variants. At this point, it appears Apple is getting ready to release Mac OS X 10.6.8 relatively soon, perhaps even ahead of the WWDC that kicks off on June 6.

As for Lion’s release, latest rumors indicated that after widespread internal testing Apple could release the OS sooner than initially expected – not in July or August, maybe at the WWDC. A WWDC release, however, would appear strange considering Lion Developer Preview 3 still has several bugs to fix and a GM build hasn’t been seeded yet. Apple is undoubtedly “enhancing” the Mac App Store’s underlying code to make the transition to Lion easier and the download process as smooth as possible, though it seems likely that the company will also sell boxed copies (DVDs or portable USB keys, as many suggested) for those users unable to download gigabytes of data from the App Store.

Samsung’s Lawyers Ask Apple To See iPhone 5 and iPad 3

As part of the ongoing lawsuits between Apple and Samsung, started back in April when Apple sued Samsung over the “look and feel” of the Galaxy phones and tablets, This Is My Next points to an interesting piece of information that details how Samsung’s lawyers have asked Apple’s legal team to hand over “final, commercial versions” of the next-generation iPhone and iPad, whether they’ll be called iPhone 4S, iPhone 5 and iPad 3 or not. Samsung is also asking to see the retail packaging design of the devices to evaluate if their future products, like the Droid Charge and the Galaxy Tab 10.1, could share similar features with them and be subject to legal action from Apple – that is, assuming both Apple and Samsung products come out at the same time in the next months.

This move comes after a judge ruled Samsung should hand over prototypes of the Droid Charge, Galaxy Tab 8.9, Galaxy Tab 10.1, Infuse 4G and Galaxy S 2 to Apple’s external legal team for evaluation in regards to the lawsuit. Similarly to Apple’s request, Samsung says only the company’s lawyers would be able to see the iPhone 5 and iPad 3, with no one else inside the company (hardware engineers, executives, and so forth) getting access to the units.

Samsung’s asking for a court order requiring Apple to produce “the final, commercial versions” of the next-generation iPhone and iPad and their respective packaging by June 13, 2011, so it can evaluate whether there’ll be confusion between Samsung and Apple’s future products. If the final versions aren’t available, Samsung wants “the most current version of each to be produced instead.

Samsung says “fundamental fairness” requires Apple to give up its future products, since Samsung had to do the same. Tellingly, Samsung doesn’t reference any precedent or law to bolster this line of argument — it’s basically just asking the court to be nice.

Basing on “internet reports” and “Apple’s past practice”, Samsung believes new devices from Apple are in the works, and in order to avoid future confusion with their products they’re asking the court to apply the same procedure that granted Apple’s lawyers access to Samsung’s upcoming products. The obvious difference is that, while Samsung teased / demoed / announced / gave away some of these devices for free in the past (like the Galaxy Tabs at Google I/O), Apple’s usual veil of secrecy made sure there’s no official word yet of the iPhone 5 and iPad 3 – just rumors. But as Samsung says Apple will discontinue existing devices when the new ones come out, they want to see final versions of production units of iPhones and iPads coming out later this year or in 2012. As Nilay Patel at This Is My Next points out, this is kind of strange considering Apple usually keeps old devices available for sale on its website even if new ones are available (example: iPhone 3GS).

So why is Samsung even pursuing this? I think it’s a calculated gamble for additional leverage. Apple and Samsung held negotiations for a year before giving up and heading to the courts, and I’m reliably informed that there haven’t been any substantive settlement discussions since Apple first filed its complaint. That means talks have been at a standstill for a long time now, and I wouldn’t be surprised if Samsung was trying to put some additional heat on Apple to try and kick negotiations back into gear.

The full breakdown of Samsung’s latest request can be read over at This Is My Next. After Apple’s initial lawsuit, Samsung fired back with countersuits in Europe and Asia, as well as in the United States.

Google Rolling Out Revamped Mobile Search UI

As noted by some of our readers overnight, Google is rolling out a revamped search interface which better showcases all the services offered by Google and allows you to easily and quickly switch between Search, Images, Gmail, Blogs and more. The new page design is not available for everyone (I can’t see it on my iPhone 4 in Italy), as it’s apparently slowly propagating internationally. MacStories reader Kevin, however, managed to grab some screenshots of the updated mobile interface; a new bar at the top provides links to Google Search, Images, Blogs and Gmail, and a “more” button to expand the bar and reveal the icons seen in the screenshots above. Another section of the new top bar displays the Google account you’re currently logged in with, as well as two tabs for Search and Apps. In the Apps section, Google has a Gmail shortcut that takes you to the usual mobile mail interface for iOS devices. Other services are likely visible in the Search tab of international Google domains, as our reader could only see the new design on Google.lu.

Google has updated several of its online services and web apps over the past months to be more functional on iOS and Android devices. Together with Instant and App Store search results, Google made lots of changes to Gmail mobile, improved the weather widget and completely revamped the Maps web app last week. Check out more screenshots below. [Thanks, Kevin] Read more