Everything you need to know about buying iPhones, iPads and other iOS devices
iPod
iOS has a big problem. iTunes…
Feb 10th
iOS has a big problem.
iTunes is a poor net citizen because Bandwidth is not free.
It’s a bandwidth hog.
Apple is proud of the Eco- friendly power efficiency of its hardware, but what about the overall energy footprint and the cost of managing iOS data so inefficiently. Gigabytes of downloads wasting Electricity, Time and Network Bandwidth. Multiply that by the 100’s of millions of iOS devices out there and you can see that it is a real problem.
Apple needs to realize that it is doing a disservice to customers who have multiple iOS devices in their home.
Just imagine a home with 2 kids and 2 adults.
Maybe 4 iPhones and 2 iPads.
Just imagine that all have an average of 50 Apps and that each App is refreshed once a year on average. There may also be 2 iOS updates on each device a year weighing in at over 1GB each.
Suppose that the average App. is 250MB in size; that would work out to be about 74 GB of bandwidth bandwidth used just to keep the software up to date for those devices.
My iPhone has 262 apps 18.72 GB. Typical?
These are conservative estimates.
Then imagine that you’ve got a few iMacs or Mac Books or PCs running iTunes.
When they fire up they also want to download the exact same apps wasting even more bandwidth.
Then there is iCloud music streaming, iCloud data syncing and backup.
These devices combined with the way iTunes currently works are using up a lot of network resources. Even eating into data allocation you might have budgeted for other high bandwidth consumers like Netflix.
If your ISP charges you $1.50 / GB or more for bandwidth overages this can really start to add up. Or worse you find out that you reached your download capacity near the start of the month and you are being throttled for the remainder of the month for overall slow and aggravating internet access experience.
Apple is proud of the Eco- friendly power efficiency of its hardware, but what about the overall energy footprint and the cost of managing iOS data so inefficiently. Gigabytes of downloads wasting Electricity, Time and Network Bandwidth. Multiply that by the 100’s of millions of iOS devices out there and you can see that it is a real problem. Should iTunes on your PC and iTunes on your iOS devices be so inefficient?
Not everyone has ideal internet access. Many rural users are stuck with slow DSL, Satellite or Cellular Network internet access. Bandwidth limits are firm and overage costs are expensive.
One elegant solution would be for Airport Extremes (with USB memory stick) and Airport Time Capsules to implement (WCCP) Web Cache Communication Protocol.
This would cache .ipa and .ipsw files in a cache allocated on the 2 or 3 terabyte drive.
When another device tried to upgrade an app that had already been downloaded and cached, it gets the update from the local network. It does not have to go out to the internet to waste time and money. The user would see a delightfully fast update adding to the pleasure of owning such a well managed device.
Schools and Businesses with iOS devices are starting to see the need for caching iOS applications. Homes could benefit from this solution as well.
There were rumours that this was going to be a capability of the newly released Airport Extremes.
Airport Extreme & Time Capsule needs WCCP
What happened to this capability?
Apple should complete this capability and activate it in the next (or near future) Airport Extreme software update. This would be a really compelling reason to buy an Airport Extreme or Time Capsule over similar and cheaper competitors in the market. Greater Synergy within Apple Products to delight the owner of iOS devices would be a competitive advantage.
Apple, please, please, please fix this.
iOS 7 for iPhone 5, 4S, 4, iPod touch 5 owners
Jun 10th
iOS 7 announcment
On June 10th 2013, Apple announced their plans to release new versions of Mac OS X (Mavericks (they’re done with the Big Cats Meme. (They jokingly considered the code name Sea Lion))) for Mac Books and iMacs as well as the new Mac Pro and along with the much anticipated iOS 7.
iOS 7 promises many new features for or iPhone 5, 4S, 4, iPod touch 5 owners.
IOS 7 Available Fall 2013
Jony Ive’s influence is most definitely seen in the new iOS face-lift. Scott Forstall skeuomorphic design (making things on the phone look like real life objects) direction is gone. The look of iOS 7 is modern and fresh.
They lifted some user interface efficiencies from the Jail Break community with addition of Control Center.
iOS 7 Control Center
With Control center you can quickly control your iPhone’s settings. You can quickly switch on a flashlight, WiFi, Bluetooth, Do Not Disturb and toggle rotation lock. You can change brightness and sound volume. You can also Air Play to an Apple TV or Air Drop to other iOS 7 users that may be near by.
You can also quickly get to the clock, calculator and the camera.
It is available to iOS developers already but demand is currently keeping developer.apple.com offline. Who is actually getting through?
iOS7 beta 1 download
Where were you when Nothing Happened today?
Nov 16th
Unbelievable; Apple hyped an iTunes announcement targeting today for the past few days.
Beatles On iTunes. Really?????
Everyone was hoping for ITunes in the Cloud. But what do we get instead?
You can buy the Beatles Music Catalog on iTunes. Yawn.
The Beatles simply aren’t relevant anymore. So what if a few people who are living in the past want to download this music from iTunes. It’s ridiculous.
Most likely these people will have bought these albums in all of the prior formats including:
- 45’s
- LP’s
- 8 Track
- Audio Cassette
- Laser Disk
- Mini Compact Disk
- Compact Disk or CDs
Now the last one is the kicker.
This is just being hyped because the only one who will really benefit is Apple.
They have had a long running intellectual property battle with the Beatles Related company of Apple Corps Ltd. And being able to bring all of that to and end while potentially making even more money, is big news for Apple Inc.
It’s in Apple’s best interest to get the News Press excited with Hype like “Where were you when you heard…” that we were going to make more money today?
iOS 4.1 released
Sep 9th
Apple’s recently released iOS 4.1. It has a number of bug fixes and some significant additions.
Those fixes include remedies for the proximity sensor issue which some iPhone 4 users have experienced.
There are also some fixes for Bluetooth, and iPhone 3G performance.
There are also brand new features like High Dynamic Range photos, a feature to insure that you don’t get washed out images from your iPhone 4 camera.
HD video uploads over WiFi allows you to upload your videos to your YouTube account with a new ‘Send to YouTube’ button.
You can rent TV shows through iTunes.
And last but not least is Game Center. it adds new capabilities for multiplayer gaming including the ability to challenge friends, keep track of scores and achievements, and the ability to find new games by looking at what your friends are playing.
Apple’s recently released iOS 4.1. It has a number of bug fixes and some significant additions. Those fixes include remedies for the proximity sensor issue which some iPhone 4 users have experienced.
There are also some fixes for Bluetooth, and iPhone 3G performance.
There are also brand new features like High Dynamic Range photos, a feature to insure that you don’t get washed out images from your iPhone 4 camera.HD video uploads over WiFi allows you to upload your videos to your YouTube account with a new ‘Send to YouTube’ button.
You can rent TV shows through iTunes.
And last but not least is Game Center. it adds new capabilities for multiplayer gaming including the ability to challenge friends, keep track of scores and achievements, and the ability to find new games by looking at what your friends are playing.
iOS 4.1 released
Apple Music Event announcements
Sep 1st
At Apple’s September music event, the company announced iOS 4.1 for iPhone and iPod touch and also previewed iOS 4.2 for iPad.
iTunes 10 and Ping were announced.
Ping is a social network for iTunes users to replace the need for Google Buzz and Twitter in our lives. It may also be a Pandora rival in that you can see music recommendations based on your listening and buying habits.
They announced the following hardware updates:
iPod Nano
iPod Touch
iPod Shuffle
Apple TV
iOS 4.1
All bugs have been fixed!
That includes the proximity sensor on the iPhone 4, Bluetooth bugs across the iPod touch and iPhone, and lastly the much talked about iPhone 3G performance issues have been fixed.
HDR
iOS 4.1 also provides a new feature called High Dynamic Range Photos (HDR).
HDR is a new camera-based feature where the device camera improves the colour range of the photos you take..
HD Video & Game Center
iOS 4.1 will give us HD video uploading over WiFi to YouTube for example and also the new Game Center.
Apple’s Game Center is like Microsoft’s Xbox Live where users can play multiplayer games and be matched against anyone of similar skill in a particular game.
Availability
iOS 4.1 is available for iPhone and iPod touch as a free download next week.
iOS 4.2
During this morning’s event Apple also provided a sneak peek of iOS 4.2! There seems to be a trend there where the X.2 version is releaseed for the iPad.
iOS 4.2 is available for iPhone, iPod touch, and iPad but the real focus is for iPad. Essentially, iOS 4.2 is bringing every single feature of iOS 4.1, such as folders and multitasking, to the iPad.
Printing
iOS 4.2 is also bringing wireless printing to the iPad in the form of Print Center. We’ll be able to view print jobs, cancel them, and reprioritize them right from the iPad.
AirPlay
For all three iPhone, iPod touch, and iPad, iOS 4.2 is bringing a feature called AirPlay which is a renamed AirTunes feature but can now stream photos and videos along with audio to your AppleTV from any iOS device via WiFi.
Availability
iOS 4.2 is available for iPhone, iPod touch, and iPad as a free download in November 2010.
The new iPods can be pre-ordered today and will ship next week.
Apple Music Event with Live Streaming 01 Sep. 2010
Sep 1st
Apple Music Event Sept 1 2010
Apple has announced it will be holding a “special Music event” in San Francisco on September 1 2010, and although the company has not preannounced the agenda, for the last several years the company has used late-summer/early-autumn events to introduce additions to its iTunes application and service as well as new iPods in time for the end-of-year holiday buying season.
Rumoured release items include:
- Longer Song/Video Previews with iTunes Music Store
- Syncing iTunes over the air or in the clouds (Apple is building a $1 Billion data center to handle this)
- New iPod touch with front and back facing camera and LED Flash that is facetime capable
- New Apple TV
- New iPod Nano
You can follow the announcements via a live stream feed available at http://apple.com at 10 AM PST Sept. 01 2010. They usually keep the broadcast and make it available in iTunes University after that.
