Oct 04

iPhone 4S Rumor Fact Check: How Pre-Event Speculation Held Up

Posted in: Apple, iPhone, iphone 4s, Phones, rumors, Today's Chili

To say expectations were high for Tuesday’s iPhone event at Apple HQ would be an understatement.

Apple is infamously secretive, and few words of what news Apple’s event held in store were leaked prior to the event. Or rather, few accurate words. Most of the other rumors were dispelled.

We’ve taken a look at a few of the most pervasive rumors to have made the rounds before the event, as proposed by publication. Let’s see how everyone checked out.

The Good

Some rumors, reports and predictions were right on.

Sprint would carry the iPhone
The Wall Street Journal spoke truth when they reported that the nation’s third largest carrier would begin carrying the iPhone this year.

  • No Steve Jobs
    We predicted that Steve Jobs would be a no-show (onstage at least) at today’s iPhone event. As CEO, it made sense that Tim Cook would lead the event, with other members of Apple’s team jumping in for various demos.

    The “Meh”

    Some speculation was down the middle: Not entirely false, though not entirely true, either.

    Apple’s voice control and recognition system, Siri.
    Everything about it was pretty spot-on, except for the name, which 9to5Mac, which broke the news, said would be called Assistant.

    The Gnarly

    Here are some predictions that were big stinkers: They were completely wrong. Maybe Apple laid a false trail that they picked up on, but it’s more likely that people just let their imaginations run a bit wild.

    NFC capabilities
    One of the earliest rumors was that the next iPhone would feature NFC. Bloomberg perpetuated this story in January. BGR added fuel to the fire in May, reporting from a source that an NFC-enabled iPhone was all but “imminent.”

    The next iPhone would sport a different look
    A larger, flatter, teardrop-shaped iPhone did not make an appearance today. This Is My Next started that rumor with a mockup posted on their site, and a host of mockups and case designs followed suit. An iPhone with a flat metal back (9to5Mac) also didn’t show up. Neither did one with curved glass (Digitimes).

    The name
    We now know it’s the iPhone 4S and not the iPhone 5. Being Apple’s next iPhone, pretty much every tech blog — us included — referred to Apple’s next generation iPhone as the iPhone 5.

    The iPad 3 would make a surprise debut.
    The parts may be (may be) being prepared, Digitimes, but no iPad 3 landed today.

    Two iPhones
    Deutsche Bank analyst Chris Whitmore was one of the first to start this rumor, that Apple would be releasing a dramatically changed iPhone 5 and a budget iPhone.


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    Oct 03

    Apple’s Rumored Virtual Assistant Could Outshine the New iPhone

    Posted in: Apple, rumors, Software and Operating Systems, Today's Chili

    Buzz surrounding Apple’s Tuesday event has never been higher, as consumers eagerly await the announcement of the next generation iPhone. But the new hardware could take a back seat to a bigger announcement: a potential voice control software feature that could be released with the latest version of iOS 5.

    The voice control feature — referred to by Apple pundits and bloggers as “Assistant” — could change the way people interact with their iPhones, using conversation with an artificially intelligent assistant to help make decisions and schedule daily activities.

    “This is an area in which Apple has been trailing Google and is playing catch-up,” Forrester analyst Charles Golvin said in an interview. “Similar to the notifications improvements [in the iOS 5 beta] and the ability to use the volume control button as a camera shutter.”

    This type of service has been a long time coming for Apple. Former Apple CEO John Sculley first described such a user experience feature in his 1987 book Odyssey. He called the concept the “Knowledge Navigator,” and Apple subsequently released several video demos over the next several years illustrating how the idea would work. The Knowledge Navigator concept takes place on a tablet-computer (decades before Apple unveiled the iPad), incorporating advanced text-to-speech functionality, a powerful speech comprehension system and a multi-touch gesture interface much like that which is used in iOS.

    Back in the late ’80s, Scully’s lofty visions of the future were the stuff of dreams. Today, we’re much closer to this becoming a reality. We’ve got intuitive, portable touchscreen devices that house powerful processors with enough memory to handle such impressive tasks.
    To boot, we’ve got chips and software that can back up the processes required for complex speech analysis.

    Apple had the hardware portions of its Knowledge Navigator concept pretty much nailed down with the latest iterations of the iPhone and iPad, but lacked the text-to-speech and speech-understanding chops. Until a start-up named Siri came along.

    Siri began as a voice recognition app for the iPhone. The app sounds similar to Google’s voice search, which is integrated into Google Search on iOS and is a standalone app on Android and other platforms. With Siri, instead of just searching for a specific topic, place or person using your voice, you’re giving more descriptive instructions. One command, for example, may be “Find the nearest good Chinese food restaurant.” At launch, Siri was integrated with about 20 different web information services, so rather than just taking you to the search results page for “good Chinese food restaurants,” it would bring up Yelp results for the highest-ranking restaurants near your GPS-determined location.

    But it’s much more than just a digital Zagat’s. Siri calls itself a “Virtual Personal Assistant.” Rather than just issuing the app commands or Google-style search phrases, you interact with it through conversation. Saying something like “I’d like a table for six at Flour and Water” would prompt the app to make a reservation using OpenTable. And if you haven’t provided enough information for it to complete a task, it will prompt you to elaborate. Siri then uses information about your personal preferences and interaction history so it can better accomplish specific tasks. As you use it more, it learns your preferences and improves its performance.


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    Oct 03

    Vodafone Jumps the Gun With 64GB iPhone 4S and 8GB iPhone 4 Listings

    Posted in: iphone 4s, leaks, Phones, rumors, Today's Chili, vodafone

    The 64GB iPhone 4S, and 8GB iPhone 4 revealed by Vodafone’s inventory system

    Oh, Vodafone, what did you do? It seems that some over-efficient employee over at Vodafone Germany has prematurely updated its product list to include the new iPhone 4S. Even better, it lists a 64GB model, in both black and white colorways, and the 8GB iPhone 4 which is expected to take the place of the current low-end iPhone 3GS.

    The info can be found in a compatibility drop-down box. I took this particular screen-grab on the product page for Elgato’s Tivizen TV tuner for iOS devices, but it can be found anywhere that regular iPhone 4 accessories can be seen (this iCandy case, for example).

    What with these listings, the iPhone 4S name hidden inside iTunes, and the complete lack of reports about iPhone 5-specific internals from leaky manufacturers, it seems that the iPhone 4S is a done deal.

    Which just leaves those curious tapered iPhone designs that the Chinese are making millions of cases for already. My guess? The new iPod Touch, wedge-shaped in order to fit in a decent camera at one end without thickening up the whole body.

    Vodafone’s over-eager listings [Vodafone via Jon Fingas]

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    Oct 03

    New iTunes Beta Reveals ‘iPhone 4S’

    Posted in: iphone 4s, Phones, rumors, Today's Chili

    Deep inside the latest iTunes beta we find a sole new iPhone: The 4S. Picture: Apple Insider

    A peek inside a configuration file inside the latest iTunes beta points to a new iPhone called the iPhone 4S. Whilst the lack of an iPhone 5 doesn’t discount another model, it looks increasingly likely that we’ll see an upgraded iPhone 4 rather than a whole new model.

    And why not? The iPhone 4 continues to top smartphone sales, and is likely Apple’s most popular product ever. A faster chip, a little more RAM and maybe — just maybe — a better camera would be enough to keep it ahead of the competition for another year or so. It also explains why Apple bothered to launch the white iPhone so close to the end of the career of the iPhone 4.

    The labels show up inside the Info.plist file in the MobileDevices bundle inside iTunes 10.5 beta 9. And take a closer look at the screen shot, taken by Apple Insider. Whilst there are two iPhone 4 models — GSM and CDMA — there is just one iPhone 4S, suggesting an all-in-one “world phone” with both radios inside. That this model still uses the CDMA iPhone icon for display inside iTunes further hints at visibly unchanged hardware.

    There’s just over a day to go before we find out for sure, so the wait won’t be a long one. In the meantime, let’s place some bets. I say that the iPod Nano will get its buttons back, just like the Shuffle did last year. If you ever tried to use the new Nanos, you’ll know why.

    Apple leaks “iPhone 4S” product name in latest iTunes beta [Apple Insider]

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    Oct 01

    Is this Apple’s cheaper iPhone 4?

    Posted in: Apple, AppleIphone, iPhone, iphone 4s, leak, leaked, mobilepostcross, rumor, rumors, Today's Chili

    See that? That just might be the cheaper iPhone that Apple’s rumored to formally unveil on Tuesday. Gizmodo Brazil managed to get a hold of a purported iPhone 4s from within a Brazilian Foxconn factory, and while the hardware itself looks just about identical to the iPhone 4 that exists today, there’s a new SKU that’s leading to understandable speculation. The N90A model number that popped up has certainly emerged before, but where things really get interesting is the “reprovado” (“disqualified”) labeling. Is this batch an early set of prototypes that didn’t quite pass QA? Will the eventual iPhone 4s even look anything like the iPhone 4 that’s on shelves today? You can bet we’ll be on hand in Cupertino to find out, and there’s no time like the present to clear out your Tuesday morning / afternoon / evening schedule (depending on time zone, of course) to find out with us.

    Is this Apple’s cheaper iPhone 4? originally appeared on Engadget on Sun, 02 Oct 2011 00:37:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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    Oct 01

    Nokia developing ‘Meltemi’ OS for feature phones?

    Posted in: Android, Apple, ios, Linux, mobile os, MobileOs, mobilepostmini, nokia, operating system, OperatingSystem, os, rumor, rumors, smartphone, Smartphones, Today's Chili

    Although Nokia still hopes Windows Phone will round out a “three-horse race” with iOS and Android, it’s said to be cooking up an entirely new operating system aimed at lower-end handsets. According to the Wall Street Journal, the OS (codenamed “Meltemi”) is meant to cement Nokia’s top dog status in emerging markets, where feature phones remain king. Makes sense: low-end phones accounted for 47 percent of the company’s device-and-services earnings in the second quarter. We’re not sure if the adage “when one door closes, another one opens” exactly applies here, but either way, it looks like we’ve hardly seen the end of software updates out of Suomi.

    Nokia developing ‘Meltemi’ OS for feature phones? originally appeared on Engadget on Sat, 01 Oct 2011 16:21:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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    Sep 29

    Rumor: Facebook iPad App to Debut at Apple iPhone Event

    Posted in: Apple, apps, ipad, rumor, rumors, Software and Operating Systems, Today's Chili

    Without a dedicated app, iPad users have had to use Facebook’s iPhone app on the iPad. Image: Facebook

    We’ve been without an official iPad Facebook app for so long it has seemed as if it would never arrive. But rumor has it we won’t be waiting for it much longer.

    There’s a chance Facebook’s iPad app and an HTML 5-based mobile platform (rumored to be codenamed “Project Spartan”) are ready to hit the prime time, according to multiple reports. Both could be introduced at Apple’s iPhone event this Tuesday.

    We first got a sneak peak at what looked to be Facebook’s iPad app in July. It was tucked away inside Facebook’s iPhone app and could be accessed by tweaking a setting when running it on your iPad (until the hack was removed). News of the mysterious “Project Spartan” also showed up this summer. The project was rumored to “use Apple’s own devices against them to break the stranglehold they have on mobile app distribution,” according to technology blog TechCrunch, but it could instead be used to demonstrate iOS 5’s HTML 5 capabilities at Apple’s upcoming media event.

    The news about “Project Spartan” was discovered on a Facebook mobile developer’s page that has since been taken down.

    If Facebook’s iPad app and Project Spartan don’t end up taking the stage at 1 Infinite Loop on Tuesday, the two products may be unveiled at Facebook HQ on a later date.

    via TechCrunch and Mashable

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    Sep 26

    Google Drive could finally be ready for launch, may just be rebranded Docs

    Posted in: chrome os, ChromeOs, Google, rumor, rumors, sync, Today's Chili
    Google Drive

    GDrive, GDisk, Google Drive – whatever they’re calling it these days – is coming. At least according to our friends over at TechCrunch. The service has not just been a rumor, but an actual product since 2007. Sadly though, it never made it past the dogfooding stage. The internal cloud storage tool for Googlers has been highly anticipated, but in 2010 it seemed like the final nail was put in its coffin when Docs was turned into a makeshift replacement with the ability to store any file. Well, Google Drive still exists, and speculation is that Google Docs will eventually be rebranded as Drive and relaunched with non-Docs file storage moved to the forefront. What’s more, it’s rumored that there will be a desktop syncing component, similar to Dropbox. Of course, the image above (from a Google-sponsored presentation) and recently discovered mentions of Drive.Google.com in Chromium don’t necessarily mean anything. But, if Google actually plans on taking this Chrome OS thing seriously, Drive seems like a natural companion service. For now though, we’re just going to have wait patiently to see what, if anything, comes of these latest rumblings.

    Google Drive could finally be ready for launch, may just be rebranded Docs originally appeared on Engadget on Mon, 26 Sep 2011 10:46:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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    Sep 21

    Report: Apple Board Member Al Gore Says iPhones (Plural) Coming in October

    Posted in: Apple, iphone 4s, Phones, rumors, Today's Chili

    The white iPhone 4 will soon be joined by new members of the iPhone family. Photo: Jon Snyder/Wired.com

    Key insight on the timing of Apple’s next iPhone release appeared today, and this time it’s no rumor. The news came straight from the mouth of an Apple insider.

    Former United States Vice President and sitting Apple boardmember Al Gore made specific reference to the release of one or more new iPhone products in October while speaking at a conference on Wednesday, according to an attendant of the conference.

    “He was talking quite passionately about global warming, Moore’s Law and its effect on computing,” said Toby Shapshak, an editor at Stuff Magazine who was at the conference, in an interview with Wired.com. “Specifically about transistors, when he said ‘Not to mention the new iPhones coming out next month.’ Then he quickly added ‘That was a plug.’”

    That’s iPhones, plural.

    This is the first time someone with any specific ties to Apple has commented on the much-anticipated iPhone 5. Based on Gore’s statement, it’s possible that we’ll be seeing multiple iPhone models. An iPhone 5 and an iPhone 4S, perhaps? Or was he just referring to the usual 16GB and 32 GB flavors?

    It’s also entirely possible that Vice President Gore elided his syllables, or could be speaking more generally about the release of millions of one specific model of phone. It’s unclear, but if it’s an Apple PR stunt, the company has certainly gotten its message across.

    According to AllthingsD sources, we’re looking at an October 4 launch date with new CEO Tim Cook at the helm, while other reports speculate at least two different iPhone model debuts. One of the two iPhones is purported to be a budget model (akin to Apple’s past 3GS model). The other, the iPhone 5, is purported to include an A5 processor and a significantly redesigned look, including a larger display, an elongated home button and a thinner, tapered shape. Sprint is also rumored to be the latest carrier to start offering the iPhone, as well.

    Only a few more weeks, and all this madness will be over. At least for a while.

    [via The Next Web]

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    Sep 20

    T-Mobile customers would be able to keep rate plans on AT&T after contract expires

    Posted in: att, leak, leaks, merger, mobilepostmini, rumor, rumors, t-mobile, TMobile, Today's Chili
    The post-merger AT&T&T world is a mysterious one. Nobody knows what it looks like or what the rules will be, and it’s quite likely we won’t know all of the answers until the acquisition has been completed — if it makes it that far. However, at least another piece has been added to the puzzle for now; according to an internal employee FAQ sent in to TmoNews, any customer in love with their current rate plan will be allowed to grandfather it into AT&T’s system and keep it after their contract expires. Curiously enough, it doesn’t say anything about what will happen if you’d like to upgrade your phone, which could be a completely different story. At least this little chunk of news serves to soothe nervous souls concerned about being forced to a higher-priced plan, which may keep a lot of people from suddenly jumping ship.

    T-Mobile customers would be able to keep rate plans on AT&T after contract expires originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 20 Sep 2011 14:44:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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