Blog

×××

  • Apple May Partner with TSMC ditching Samsung For A5 Production

    // Gradly // Apple, blog, Gadgets, iPad, iPhone, News, Rumors, Tech. No Responses

    Apple has allegedly inked a deal with chipmaker Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co. to produce the A5 chip for the iPad 2, a move that is seen as a potential loss for Samsung.

    Apple is rumored to have entered a foundry agreement with TSMC to build the A5 processor, according to EETimes. In addition to powering the new iPad 2 set for release on Friday, Apple’s custom dual-core A5 processor is also expected to power the anticipated iPhone 5, expected to debut this summer.

    Apple is expected to spend $7.8 billion on components from Samsung alone in 2011, for parts including liquid crystal displays, processors and NAND flash memory chips in mobile devices including the iPhone and iPad. The deal would make Apple the largest customer of Samsung.

    The EETimes report said Apple is making the switch for three reasons, one of them being the fact that Samsung competes with both the iPhone and the iPad with its own devices.

    Apple, according to the source, will use TSMC for three reasons: 1. Samsung competes with the iPhone and iPad; 2. TSMC has the highest yielding 40-nm process in the foundry world; and 3. TSMC has the most 40-nm capacity.

  • VMWare brings Windows to iPad as Apple readies iPhone 5

    // Gradly // Apple, blog, iPad, Microsoft, News, Rants & Raves No Responses

    Today, VMWare 3 allows you to run remote Windows, Linux, images remotely from your iPad with ‘VMWare Viewer’.  VMWare is a much more popular virtualization solution in big business so this may have a lot more people moving off their PCs and onto iPads.

  • Zite, the iPad’s Smartest Magazine Yet

    // Gradly // blog, iPad, Rants & Raves, Reviews No Responses

    Zite: a free app called that is constantly learning what you like to read on the iPad and creating a magazine finely tailored to your needs.

    Many iPad owners who have used the free Flipboard app for any length of time are familiar with its promise and its shortcomings. Sure, it looks cool — enter your Twitter name and Facebook account, and it turns those feeds into a magazine, complete with gorgeous photos, headlines and virtually flippable pages.

    Zite pulls in stories from your Twitter feed, if you wish, or your Google Reader account. Neither are necessary. You can also choose from hundreds of topics you’re interested in or start with the plain-vanilla version of the magazine. That also is not required. Every story comes with thumbs up and thumbs down icons and a button to request more of that kind of story. But none of this is truly important.

    The app’s secret sauce is this: It learns from your everyday reading. It’s constantly watching what kind of stories you click on, how long those stories are, how long you’re reading them for — and just as importantly, the stories you don’t click on. (It’ll give you less of those.) Just as Netflix and Amazon bring you movies and products that users similar to you liked, Zite is doing constant behind-the-scenes comparisons between readers, both inside the app and on the web in general.

    [via Mashable]

  • Apple to Unveil iOS 5, New MobileMe at Media Event in Early April

    // Gradly // Apple, blog, iPhone, News, Rants & Raves, Rumors No Responses

    A new rumor claims Apple will hold its annual iOS roadmap event in early April to show off iOS 5 as expected, but also states the company will also unveil an updated MobileMe service.

    Citing a “confident” source, German site Macerkopf.de reported Tuesday (via Google Translate) that the event will be held in early April at the company’s Cupertino, Calif., campus. The timing would not be a surprise, as last year’s iOS 4 preview event was held in early April.

    But the inclusion of MobileMe in the annual event would be new, and could signal that anticipated changes to the cloud-based service will be heavily integrated into the next major release of Apple’s mobile operating system for the iPhone and iPad.

    In February, The Wall Street Journal reported that Apple plans to improve MobileMe by having the service act as a “locker” to hold personal data such as photos, music and videos. It was also said that Apple is considering making the service, which currently costs $99 per year, free.

    Corroborating that information, The New York Times separately reported that Apple plans to roll out an enhanced MobileMe this year. It was said that Apple is working on improved “voice navigation” on the iPhone, allowing users to operate the device through voice commands without the need to rely on a virtual keyboard.

    Further evidence of planned changes to MobileMe came as Apple discontinued the sale of retail boxes for the service last month. It has also been rumored that the new MobileMe will rely on self-storage from a home computer for streaming, rather than remotely saved files hosted by Apple.

    [via appleinsider]