Transferring files from your old iPhone to a new iPhone 6s or iPhone 6s Plus isn’t difficult, but after a reader emailed about the many, many hours he expected to wait for the old-to-new iPhone transfer process to complete, I realized that his experience has become more common — even though it’s not necessary. Years ago, iTunes was the only (and fairly straightforward) way to transfer one iPhone’s contents to another. But now, between iCloud, larger device capacity sizes, and iTunes encryption options, there are certainly ways to turn a simple process into a day-long ordeal.
This quick How-To guide is designed to save you a wasted day by helping you select the best options in iTunes and get most of the work done ahead of time. I’ve used this process more times than I can count, and beyond working perfectly each time, it requires far fewer hours than relying on iCloud…
As far as I can tell, this advice extends to all new iOS devices. Tuck this one away til your new device gets here.
Barring unseen developments, tomorrow should see the official release of iOS 9. Macworld put together this short take on getting ready for the upgrade.
The article starts with the expected advice to back up your devices before you start on the upgrade. Sage, if not obvious, advice.
But the thing I found most interesting was this take on making sure you have a way back if things go south:
Here’s the deal: Apple “signs” versions of iOS. This tells the device that the version you wish to use is OK to use with that device. While that version is signed, you can install it on your iOS device—even if it’s a version of the operating system that’s earlier than the one you just installed.
However—and this is very important—Apple traditionally stops signing old versions of iOS just a day or two after releasing major updates (such as iOS 9). If you were to update to iOS 9 say, a week after it ships, you might find that you can’t go back to iOS 8.
Read the post to find out how to locate the old updaters on your hard drive and, failing that, find them online.
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I understand that Macminicolo is looking for your business, but this article brings up some good alternatives if you want to get away from Google and its tracking.
When Apple redesigned the MacBook Air in 2010, it created one of the best machines to ever carry its Mac label. That new laptop was a revelation: extremely thin and light, like the original Air, yet also powerful enough for most tasks and equipped with a long-lasting battery.
When it was released, the MacBook Air was absolutely groundbreaking.
For years, the MacBook Air has been a standard-bearer, the role model for every Windows ultrabook, but 2015 has not been so kind to its leadership position. Apple introduced the new 12-inch MacBook and updated the 13-inch Retina MacBook Pro, both directly competing with the Air, and for those not umbilically attached to OS X, Dell’s XPS 13 offered a compelling Windows alternative. And this week there’s the looming threat of the iPad Pro on the horizon.
When the new 12-inch MacBook was announced, I saw that as the death knell for the MacBook Air. But I did not see the iPad Pro as a MacBook Air threat until I read this.
Apple is not a company that can be accused of doing things thoughtlessly, and the decision to leave the Air’s display at the lower quality and resolution must be taken as a deliberate one. In other words, Apple is comfortable with keeping the Air as a technological straggler in its lineup. That leaves us with a choice of two most likely scenarios: either the Air is destined for a future overhaul and its first redesign in five years or it has no future at all. There’s not enough room in Apple’s lineup for a MacBook, a MacBook Air, and a MacBook Pro — the MacBook is Apple’s ultraportable machine of the future and the MacBook Pro is the do-it-all laptop of today. The MacBook Air’s position seems tenuous already, and if the alleged iPad Pro does indeed materialize, then we may as well bid adieu to the Air entirely.
That’s when I noticed the difference between the Pencil and just a stylus: It felt great. Perfect. Better than any stylus I’ve ever used by a wide margin. Not because the thing itself is so terrific—I like holding FiftyThree’s Pencil better, and there are lots of good styli out there—but because it’s the first time I’ve ever written on a screen and actually felt like I was writing on the screen. There was almost zero latency, meaning the ink appeared to flow out of the Pencil and not trail half an inch behind. With the tiniest added pressure, the line became the tiniest bit thicker. I tapped on the No. 2 pencil mode, and it wrote and shaded just like all the pencils I used to sharpen with that wall-mounted thing you had to crank.
It’s all about the latency. Make the latency disappear and then developers can really go to town.
“Customer response to iPhone 6s and iPhone 6s Plus has been extremely positive and preorders this weekend were very strong around the world,” the company said in a statement. “We are on pace to beat last year’s 10 million unit first-weekend record when the new iPhones go on sale September 25.”
Benjamin Mayo, writing for 9to5mac, on why this upgrade from 1 GB to 2 GB on the iPhone 6s and Plus matters:
RAM upgrades for the iPhones has been somewhat overdue, with many complaining apps have to relaunch too frequently on current hardware, especially on the iPhone 6 Plus. RAM affects how much app data the device can keep in memory at once. This is often seen through the number of tabs Safari can open before having to reload a website. More RAM (obviously) provides a better experience across the system. The iPhone has been stuck on 1 GB RAM since the iPhone 5 in 2012.
Read on if you are interested in how this was discovered.
Note that the onboard RAM (actually onboard the 64-bit A9 chip) is what is used by iOS to run your apps, move your data around.
This RAM is not the same as the long-term storage that holds your photos/music/etc. A 16 GB iPhone 6s has the same amount of onboard RAM (now 2 GB) as a 128 GB iPhone 6s.
A variety of gaming sites are reporting that the Apple TV limits its apps to a total of 200 MB. For example, there’s this bit from a post on well known gaming site IG:
The 200 MB limit is something of a head-scratcher, given the unveiling of a new 32 GB and 64 GB version of Apple TV today during Apple’s special live event. That storage space is earmarked exclusively for other uses, the most obvious of which being video and music files.
The reality is, 200 MB is purely the limit for the initial game load. Need more than that? No problem. Serenity Caldwell lays the details out in this post for iMore:
Let’s say you, the developer, make a side-scroller app for the Apple TV with 50 levels. All together, your app bundle comes out to be something like 4GB—too much for the Apple TV’s App Store to properly host. Instead, you can take avantage of a new tvOS/iOS feature called On-Demand Resources to slice up your app and deliver it in parts to the user.
Instead of making the user download 4GB off the bat, you slice up your app into a bunch of sections, called tags. You include the essential parts of the app—loading and launch screen, scores, settings, and the first five levels—in that 200MB bundle.
Other levels and assets are split into multiple tags that range in size from 64MB to 512MB. If you sliced up tags that all sized out to 100MB for your game, for instance, you’d have 38 additional items for download once a user installs the game, which might be just as fun as 해외토토사이트. Those don’t come all at once, however: They’re called on-demand, when a user needs them.
The iPhone 6s and 6s Plus went on sale in the wee hours this morning (just after midnight Cupertino time) and demand is already making a pretty large dent in availability.
If you order on-line for delivery, the waiting time for some phones is already at 2-3 weeks (for delivery between September 26th and October 3rd).
The in-store pickup program is for September 25th only. If you go that route, note that the 128 GB iPhone 6s Plus is already unavailable in many markets, no matter the color or carrier. In my area, the 128GB 6s is only available in a few stores, and in a single color.
In a nutshell, you agree to pay a monthly fee, to Apple (actually to Apple’s bank partner, Citizens Bank, N.A., doing business as Citizens One), for a minimum of 24 months. The fee is based on the phone you choose. As an example, if you buy a 128 GB iPhone 6s Plus, you’ll pay $44.91 a month. If you bought that phone outright, you’d pay $949, plus $129 for Apple Care+.
Some math:
Upgrade Program price: $44.91 x 24 months = $1,077.84
Pay Up Front price: $949 + $129 = $1,078
As you can see, these prices are pretty much the same. But the Upgrade Program has a terrific side benefit. Let’s say Apple comes out with a new phone in a year (not a lock, but a reasonably safe bet). After 12 months, you are free to switch to any other phone that Apple sells. You trade in your phone (straight trade, no money changes hands) and get your new phone, start a new Upgrade Program agreement at the price associated with that new phone.
With the Pay Up Front program, you keep your old phone, which you can pass along to someone else, or trade in or sell when you are ready to buy a new phone.
With the Upgrade Program, you don’t get any money for your trade-in, but if you trade in after a year, you no longer continue to pay for that old phone. In our example, with a trade-in after one year:
Upgrade Program price: $44.91 x 12 months = $538.92
If you swap phones every year, this is definitely worth considering. When you do your own math, don’t minimize the value of your used phone. After all, Apple will no doubt take that same phone and refurbish/resell it. Selling a used iPhone is relatively easy to do.
Also, consider how important AppleCare is to you. If you are very careful with phones and willing to chance going without insurance, that should factor into your decision. With the Upgrade Program, AppleCare is included and is not optional.
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You’ll notice that there is no longer a Toslink (optical audio) output on the back of the Apple TV. The only option you have is HDMI; this is fine to connect to a TV or AV amplifier, but if you want to connect an Apple TV to a DAC, and then to an amp, you’re out of luck. Of course, one option is to use both: an Apple TV 3 for music only, and the new Apple TV for videos, games, apps, etc.
The TOSLINK connector was originally designed by Toshiba as a proprietary interface for Toshiba CD players (TOSLINK = Toshiba Link) but was widely adopted by the rest of the industry.
Personally, I’ve never used the optical interface on the old Apple TV. I won’t miss it, but for folks who do use optical, good to know the deal on this.
Not quite what I was asking for in this post, but a solid start. This is a spec table, comparing basic technical specs of the iPad Pro and the Surface Pro 3.
What’s missing, for me, is the technical comparison of the Surface Pro 3 stylus and the Apple Pencil. I assume someone is working on that one as we speak.
Caitlin McGarry, writing for MacWorld, pulled together a lot of info on the new iPhone 6s and 6s Plus.
Most importantly:
Set an alarm, because iPhone 6s and 6s Plus pre-orders kick off at 12:01 a.m. Pacific on Saturday, September 12. That means 3:01 a.m. for you East Coasters. At least you might not have to work the next day.
Daniel Eran Dilger, writing for Apple Insider, put together this terrific post, detailing the hands on experience with the iPad Pro and Apple Pencil. There are a number of videos embedded in the article, but the video below is the one I found most compelling.
The video shows Apple Pencil being put through some of its paces in Adobe Sketch. Watch the video, then come back and read on.
If you’ve ever used a tablet and pen/stylus, you’ve seen much of this before. From everything I’ve read and seen, Pencil captures the angle and force as well as any tablet, which may or may not include a pen for tablet, on the market, but it does so with no lag, becoming an almost perfect mirror of the tool being emulated. That’s what a high end tablet should do.
The “Aha” moment for me, involves content creation. I’ve always seen the iPad as a second class citizen when it comes to creating content. Unless I use an external keyboard, typing on an iPad is never as fast as on my laptop. Without outside assistance, the angle of the iPad is not easy to get just right, no match for my laptop’s hinged screen. Document creation and a management is more sophisticated, more capable in OS X. Drag and drop between applications, for example, has not been mirrored in iOS. Yet.
This is by no means a complaint. The advantage the iPad brings is obvious. Incredible portability, as well as compatibility between my iPhone and iPad and, more and more, between iOS and OS X. A perfect example of this is Safari. When I wake up in the morning, I grab my iPad and use Safari to dig in to the news of the day. When I move over to my Mac, I can access all the tabs I opened on my iPad in the OS X version of Safari. Easy peasy.
I love the portability of my iPad, but do the majority of my content creation on my Mac. I truly appreciate having both of them, truly appreciate the bridge Apple built between them.
Back to the “Aha” moment. Watching the video embedded below, I could see myself creating content on an iPad Pro that I could not create on my Mac, at least not without adding a pretty expensive tablet setup. It’s still pretty early in the game, app-wise, but I can see myself creating annotations, first cuts at graphics/logos/icons, page layouts, all with a direct touch and portability that I don’t have on my Mac.
With the iPad Pro, the stylus is a first class citizen, as opposed to a 3rd party add-on with limited app support. I’ll be interested to see how Pencil compares, head to head, with the stylus that ships with Surface and Samsung’s offerings. I suspect the Apple Pencil is head and shoulders a better experience.
Regardless, with the iPad Pro, I now see the iPad in a different light, not just as a content consumer, but as a first class content creation tool.
The Wall Street Journal ran a small interview this morning, giving Sir Jony the opportunity to talk about the creation of the Hermès Apple Watch and the partnership with Apple.
A few things that stood out:
Allowing Hermès’ symbols to upstage Apple’s is a first, Mr. Ive said. “I’ve been at Apple 23 years and this is conspicuous and singular. I’ve never known anything like this,” he said.
And on pricing:
The watch, which goes on sale Oct. 5, will be available in Apple and Hermès stores in 14 countries including the U.S., China, France and Switzerland. Prices range from $1,100 for the classic bracelet with a 38-mm case to $1,500 for the cuff, which comes with a 42-mm case.
And:
But for Mr. Ive, the attention he and Mr. Dumas lavished on the Apple Watch Hermès doesn’t give it any special status.
“Look at this next to one of the sport collection,” he says, referring to the $349 rubber-bracelet version that accounts for the majority of watch sales to date, according to people familiar with the matter. “There’s not one that had more care invested in its designing or making.”
That last point is important. Apple puts care and detailed craft into every product they make. The sports band matters to the design team, even though it is the cheapest band they sell. That’s a core principle.
Malicious apps that disable Android phones until owners pay a hefty ransom are growing increasingly malevolent and sophisticated as evidenced by a newly discovered sample that resets device PIN locks, an advance that requires a factory reset.
September 9 was a massive day for Apple. As I sat in the audience watching Tim Cook and Phil Schiller launching product after product, it struck me that Apple had really focused on the details with all of its latest releases—both software and hardware. That’s important for Apple because I believe that’s where one of the company’s main competitive advantages lies.
There were three main product announcements in the keynote: iPhone, iPad Pro, and Apple TV. There were however, several smaller announcements, like new Apple Watches and an iPhone upgrade program that will continue to propel Apple to the top of market in their respective categories. Just as Apple refines its strategy with innovation and precision, teams can enhance their own processes with Agile practices.
When I started thinking about the keynote announcements and talking to people about the products, I noticed that many were taking the announcements as separate, individual releases. You can certainly do that, but with Apple, it’s the entirety of the ecosystem, and therefore the announcements, that make the difference.
Each product on its own is impressive, but when put together, the enormity of what Apple released is truly stunning.
iPhone
When looking at iPhone, you have to look at the new hardware, but also how the hardware and iOS 9 work together. This is a huge advantage for Apple because they control both. This is what makes iPhone so compelling.
We know that this is an “s” model year for iPhone, which means the outer design remains pretty much the same as the model released a year ago. I think we can all agree that the design of iPhone 6 is really good, so no major changes were needed.
Design elements aside, Apple changed everything else, making this a truly new device, and a compelling upgrade, especially for those people coming from the “5 series” models.
One of the most popular and most used features of iPhone is the camera. With a new 12-megapixel camera, Apple gave users the tools to take even better photos. However, raising the megapixels in the camera isn’t enough on its own, you also have to make sure the captured images look crisp and clear. Apple did that by designing its own signal processor to ensure color and detail are maintained in the image.
These are the details that Apple strives to get right. These are also the details that many consumers don’t recognize—they just see great photos and a higher megapixel camera.
Add to that Live Photos, a new feature that captures moments immediately before and after a picture is taken, and support for 4K video, and you have something really compelling for iPhone users.
Perhaps one of the greatest new features of the iPhone is 3D Touch. I say that because I see this as a new way to navigate iPhone.
We look to Apple for clarity in the user interface. What they did with 3D Touch is save us time when doing simple tasks on iPhone. For instance, from the Home screen, we have to go into an app and then dive into to whatever it is we want to do. When done, we have to back ourselves out again to the main screen. Depending on the app, it’s a few taps at the very least.
With 3D Touch we are able to initiate many tasks by just adding a bit of pressure to the app icon and choosing from the menu. This is called a “Peek” and it gives us a preview of a mail or message. Adding a bit more pressure and the message will “Pop” allowing us to interact with it as we normally would. All of this is done without losing our original position in the iPhone. This is huge.
Like notifications addressed a pain point for users in always having to navigate to different apps to see what’s new, 3D Touch addresses a navigation pain point that will eliminate the number of taps we need to make in order to get something done.
The changes in hardware, along with the integration of iOS 9, make the new iPhone 6s and iPhone 6s Plus a really compelling update.
The future of TV or the future of Apple TV?
As a long time user, I really like the new Apple TV. The Siri-enabled remote will help me navigate through content in a fraction of the time it took before. However, I’m not sure if I understand Apple when they say this is the future of TV.
To me, TV is about content and the future of TV should include ways to view that content without needing a cable or satellite subscription. With the many Apple TV enhancements yesterday, this fundamental content problem was not addressed.
It could be that Apple’s view of TV includes features to watch content without a subscription, but they just weren’t able to pull it off in time for the event. Bundling channels (or maybe they’ll be called apps), and being able to search across those channels for my programming is exactly what I would like in a future Apple TV service.
They did make some improvements with current partners, most notably MLB.com. That, I would agree is the future of TV. The demo was impressive, it was interactive, and if that’s what Apple has in mind for the future, I’m all in.
Much of the success of the current Apple TV will depend on if developers create apps for it. Games, shopping, and other entertainment and media will be welcome by users, but they have to be compelling enough to make it a goto device.
I like and appreciate the changes and features coming with Apple TV, especially Siri search, but I think it’s going to take some time for Apple to make this new platform the future.
Having said that, I will be the first one to buy Apple TV because the experience is going to be so much better. Apple once again solved a navigation problem that I welcome with open arms.
iPad Pro
One question I had about iPad Pro going into the event was, “who is Apple going to market this device to? Professionals? Creatives? Gamers?” The answer appears to be, yes.
Apple’s Phil Schiller called on a number of companies to demo products across a variety of markets, effectively showing iPad Pro can work for everyone.
After using iPad Pro yesterday, I can tell you it’s gorgeous. The screen is outstanding, it’s fast, the battery will last 10 hours, and it’s lightweight. The addition of Apple Pencil certainly makes this a great device for creative professionals.
I didn’t get an opportunity to use the pencil, but watching others that did, there didn’t appear to be any latency when drawing on the iPad Pro screen. Latency in this kind of application is incredibly frustrating and would make the device virtually useless as anything other than a toy. That didn’t happen, so the opportunities for iPad Pro seem wide open.
I’m looking forward to getting my hands on an iPad Pro and using it for an extended period of time to see how it fits into my current workflow and lifestyle. I currently use both the iPad Air 2 and iPad mini 3 all the time, so this will be interesting for me.
Overall thoughts
In addition to the big announcements at the event, Apple will also release new gold and rose gold aluminum Apple Watch Sport models, new watch bands, Hermes watches, watchOS 2, tvOS, iOS 9, an iPhone upgrade program, and OS X El Capitan.
Most of these items got little to no attention on stage, which should give you an idea of just how big of a day it was for Apple.
I don’t look for Apple to stay on par with its competition, I look for them to set the standard for everything that’s going to happen in the next year. From what I saw yesterday, both at the keynote and touching the products myself, they’ve done that.
There are lots of things people wonder about Ahrendts. Why did she, the celebrated architect of Burberry’s turnaround, give up her post as CEO and uproot her family to become, at best, the third or fourth most powerful executive at the $183-billion-in-sales tech giant?
Here’s another: What does Apple think Ahrendts—whom it paid an astounding $73.4 million in stock and cash in her first year—brings to a company that has redefined the technology and retail sectors, one that, at this point, seems not to need a whole lot of anything? And a third: What has she accomplished so far?
A lot of people don’t understand Ahrendts role at Apple, assuming she’d be as high profile at Apple as she was at Burberry. It’s the curse of short term thinking and not realizing that both Ahrendts and Cook are, as usual, playing the Long Game.
In many fundamental ways, the iPhone breaks the rules of business, especially the rules of the tech business. Those rules have more or less always held that hardware devices keep getting cheaper and less profitable over time. That happens because hardware is easy to commoditize; what seems magical today is widely copied and becomes commonplace tomorrow. It happened in personal computers; it happened in servers; it happened in cameras, music players, and — despite Apple’s best efforts — it may be happening in tablets.
All this is true.
Instead of killing Apple, commoditization caused something stranger — it hobbled Apple’s main competitor in the smartphone business: Samsung, which until last year was gaining a creeping share of the profits in the smartphone business. At its peak in mid-2013, Samsung was making close to half of every dollar in the smartphone business, according to the research firm Canaccord. (Apple was making the other half.)
But the rise of low-end, pretty great Android phones made by Chinese upstarts like Xiaomi — and the surging popularity of Apple’s large-screen iPhones — put Samsung in a bind. In July, Samsung reported its seventh straight quarter of declining profits. Canaccord’s latest estimate shows Samsung making 15 percent of profits in smartphones, with Apple making 92 percent. (The numbers add up to more than 100 because everyone else in the smartphone industry loses money, so their share of the profits is negative.)
You can expect Apple’s proportion to grow. As analysts at Credit Suisse explained in a note last week, only about 30 percent of the world’s 400 million iPhone users have upgraded to the large-screen models Apple introduced last year. Apple is bound to reap more money as the majority of its users inevitably jump to big phones over the next few years. In other words, for the foreseeable future, Apple stands virtually alone: It may be the only company making any money selling phones.
Cream rises to the top. Continued innovation (and a strong, well-protected ecosystem) protects Apple from commoditization.
