The iPhone 7 offers IP67 dust and water protection. What does that mean? – CNET
The missing headphone jack on the iPhone 7 and iPhone 7 Plus means your current headphones are likely useless (without using an annoying adapter), but closing up that hole helps to make the new iPhones water- and dust-resistant.
For the first time, Apple has certified an iPhone as “splash, water and dust resistant.” The new iPhones received an official IP67 rating. Let’s break down what that means for you, your next iPhone and your next bathroom break. (After all, Super Mario is coming to the iPhone.)
Decoding IP codes
The “IP” in “IP code” stands for Ingress Protection. IP codes are standards set by the International Electrotechnical Commission (IEC) to measure the “degrees of protection provided by enclosures for electrical equipment.”
The first number in the two-digit IP code represents how well the enclosure protects against the ingress of solid objects, from hands and fingers to tiny dust particles. The solid-protection scale runs from 0 (No protection; you could lose a hand) to 6 (Protection from contact with harmful dust; I take all my calls in the attic).
The second number represents the degree to which the enclosure protects against the ingress of water, from dripping water to full immersion. The water-protection scale runs from 0 (No protection; do not use if it looks like it might rain) to 8 (Protected from immersion in water with a depth of more than 1 meter; let’s go swimming!).
IP67: What the numbers mean
The IP67 rating for the iPhone 7 and iPhone 7 Plus means Apple’s new phones achieved the highest rating for dust protection and the second-highest rating for water protection.
More from Apple’s event
- Apple just made its jumbo phone more irresistible
- Apple’s AirPods may look weird, but they’ll change the headphone market
- Your iPhone 7 upgrade checklist
- iPhone 7 versus iPhone 7 Plus: What’s the difference?
The dust rating of a 6 means the phones offer “protection from contact with harmful dust.” That’s one step up from a 5 rating’s “partial protection from contact with harmful dust.”
The water rating of a 7 means the phones are “protected from immersion in water with a depth of up to 1 meter (3.2 feet) for up to 30 minutes.” That’s one step up from a 6 rating’s “Protection from water projected in powerful jets.” The highest 8 rating means the device is “protected from immersion in water with a depth of more than 1 meter.”
For more, my colleague Dan Graziano explains water and dust ratings for your gadgets.
So, can I swim or poop with an iPhone 7?
Given that most, if not all, toilets feature a water depth less than 1 meter, the iPhone 7 or iPhone 7 Plus can, in theory, survive an accidental drop in the toilet. You might even get away with dropping it in the shallow end of a pool. And you can put aside your fears of talking, texting or playing Pokemon Go in the rain.
The added water resistance is the big draw here, but the phones’ protection from dust should appeal to beach goers and those who live or work in desert climates.
Despite trumpeting the new iPhones’ splash- and water-resistant qualities, Apple still makes an important footnote to these claims. Read the fine print and you’ll discover that Apple states, “Liquid damage not covered under warranty.”
For more, get everything you need to know about Apple’s iPhone 7 event.
Planning on using an old case with the iPhone 7? Nope. – CNET
Maybe you noticed that, unlike previous non-“S”-year iPhone updates, the iPhone 7 and 7 Plus look a lot like their predecessors. In fact, a few small details aside (such as the speaker grille and antenna design), they’re almost identical.
The technical specifications on Apple’s website for the iPhone 6S and the iPhone 7 (including all the Plus models), suggest they have they exact same dimensions. The buttons are all in the same place, and despite the lack of a 3.5mm jack for analog headphones, your old case should, theoretically, fit the new model. The location of the headphone jack has been replaced with a speaker grille which shouldn’t interfere the fit of a case.
However, there is one major design difference that matters: the camera.
The camera bumps on the iPhone 7 and iPhone 7 Plus are much larger than previous models, rendering cases and some accessories incompatible.
James Martin/CNET
The lens protrusion on the iPhone 6 and iPhone 6S is small and juts out from the casing, almost as if it’s glued on. With the iPhone 7, the camera optics are much larger and the casing slightly curves up to the rim of the camera housing. With the iPhone 7 Plus you have a dual-camera layout, which is not just taller than the old optics, it’s several times wider, as well.
Apple iPhone 7 has everything but the headphone…
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The official Apple cases for the iPhone 6S look similar to those for the iPhone 7, but they will not fit properly. This means if you spent $99 on the Smart Battery Case, you’ll have to buy a new one for the latest iPhone.
This change will affect other accessories as well, such as the Olloclip.
Fortunately, everything else should work just fine, including your wired headphones via an included Lightning adapter.
Listening to music and charging your iPhone 7 at the same time costs extra – CNET
One of the most talked-about changes in the iPhone 7 is its lack of a 3.5mm headphone jack.
Inside the box, you no longer get a pair of 3.5mm EarPods. Instead, you get a pair of Lightning EarPods, as well as a Lightning to 3.5mm adapter, which will allow you to continue using your analog headphones.
But, there’s a catch. If you want to listen to your wired headphones — even the new Lightning EarPods — and your phone is in need of a charge, you’ll need to buy an extra adapter or go wireless.
Here are some of the options for listening with headphones as you charge your iPhone 7.
Apple.com
Apple’s Lighting Dock. Apple sells an iPhone Lightning Dock. It’s $49 and it holds the iPhone upright with nothing more than a rigid Lightning connection. It has a Lightning port on the back for its power supply and flanking that port is a 3.5mm jack. Presumably, this is geared more towards running a 3.5mm cable from the dock to a sound system, but it could work for a portable solution for jamming out with analog headphones while charging. That said, it isn’t going to be pretty.
Apple AirPods wireless earphones
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Belkin’s adapter. Third-party accessory maker Belkin has created the Lightning Audio + Charge RockStar adapter, which allows passthrough charging via Lightning while also listening to Lightning-compatible headphones. However, it isn’t cheap either. It’s $39.99 (£30.07 or AU$52.32), and if you want to listen to 3.5mm headphones, you will still need use a second adapter — the one included with the iPhone.
Bluetooth headphones. In the end, you might decide to invest in a pair of Bluetooth headphones, which start for around $20 (£15.05 or AU$26.18) online. But they quickly go up in price, especially if you want quality Bluetooth headphones. The cheapest ones on Apple’s website are $99.95 (£75.29 or AU$130.88), and only go up from there.
No matter how you cut it, some of the workarounds are unsightly and all of them will cost a fair amount of money to accomplish something that was quite simple before.
Here’s what the new S Pen can do on the Galaxy Note 7
Learn what you can do with the S Pen and the Galaxy Note 7
Samsung’s flagship releases for 2016, the Galaxy S7 and Galaxy Note 7, are arguably the top-class smartphones of the year. While there are a number of similarities in terms of design and features between the two phones, the most marked difference is the Note 7’s S Pen, which adds a host of awesome features.
From tools to keep you productive and organized to instant translations and animated gifs, the S Pen will be at the center of your experience with the Note 7 if you embrace it. Here are the core features that use the S Pen and how they work.
Take notes with Always-On Display
If you’ve got Always-On Display enabled, you can start using your S Pen without even unlocking your Note 7. Simply pop out the S Pen and the Always-On Display switches to a white-on-black notepad that lets you scribble and scrawl a note or sketch in seconds. Once you’ve finished your note it will be automatically saved to the Notes app.
Air Command
Air Command is the hub of your S Pen experience. Every time you take out the S Pen when the screen is unlocked, Air Command will automatically pop up with a menu of available options.
If you’ve already got your S Pen in hand, you can quickly access the Air Command menu by either tap the floating Air Command icon, or with a quick press of the side button on the S Pen while hovering the pen tip over the screen.
The Air Command menu lets you access all the special functions available for the S Pen. Let’s take a closer look.
Create Note
Jotting down notes with the S Pen has been the cornerstone for the Galaxy Note line since day one. With the Galaxy Note 7, Samsung has introduced Samsung Notes, the new app that is home to everything you do with the S Pen. When you select Create Note from the Air Command menu, you get sent to the default notepad, where you can quickly jot down your note with the pen.
If you’d prefer to type with the on-screen keyboard, simply tap the Text icon at the top with the S Pen. You’ll get rich text options such as numbered and bulleted lists, checklists, and the options to toggle bold, italics, underline, and text color.
If you’ve got an idea to sketch out, tap the Brush icon to bring up a sketch pad with seven drawing tools and a color wheel. For each drawing tool, you’re able to change the size and opacity of the stroke, which gives you total control over your sketches. If you’re particularly proud of your handiwork, Samsung has included integration with the artistic social media platform PEN.UP. Simply tap the icon in the bottom-right corner and send your sketch off to the world.
There are also Image and Voice icons that let you add extra multimedia touches to add to your note.
Smart Select
Smart Select lets you quickly isolate a portion of your screen and save it for later, or share it immediately via MMS, email, or your preferred social media platform. You can also Screen Select an image or website and then extract any and all text from it. It must be a uniform font — no matter how neat the writing, hand-written text can’t be extracted.
But what really separates Smart Select on the Galaxy Note 7 from previous editions is the ability to turn any video playing on your screen into an animated GIF. To create an animated GIF, simply go to your recorded video, or a video on YouTube and find the part you want to convert. Tap the Screen Select icon with your S Pen from the Air Command menu, then tap the Animated GIF icon in the top-right of the screen. This brings up a crop box showing the portion of the screen that will be recorded. Use the white outline to drag the crop box to where you want, then drag the corners to adjust the size and shape of the gif as you see fit. You also have an option of recording in high quality or standard quality (if you’re planning to send it to a friend via text, you’ll probably want to go with standard).
Once you’ve got your crop box set, simply tap play on the video then tap the record button. You can record up to 15 seconds as an animated gif, or tap Stop when you want to end it. From there, you’re able to draw over the GIF with the S Pen to add a caption and edit it however you please. Once you’re satisfied with the GIF, tap Save. It’s a pretty convenient feature.
If you’re reviewing your GIFs in the Gallery later and realize you recorded for too long (say, you accidentally recorded the play button when you started the video), you can edit the animation’s duration, change the aspect ratio, increase the gif speed, and add decorations like another image, Snapchat-esque stickers or labels — in addition to drawing using the S Pen.
Screen Write
Annotating an image or screenshot has never been easier. Simply launch the Air Command menu and tap screenwrite and your phone will take a screenshot of whatever you’re looking at.
From there, you simply use the S Pen to annotate the screenshot with whatever you want to add. Tap the Pen icon at the top to reveal all the pen tools and color options available. If you’re looking at a longer article that won’t fit on the screen, you can use Scroll Capture to create a longer screengrab. You’re also able to crop, save and share your annotated screenshots all from the same screen.
Translate
Whether you’re travelling in a new country, or simply trying to read something in a foreign language, the Translate tool is a super convenient (though occasionally buggy) S Pen trick.
Grab the S Pen and tap Translate from the Air Command menu to launch the translate menu, which will float at the top of the screen and allow you to navigate around the web or through files on your phone. If you come across a word in a different language, simply choose the language, then hover the S Pen over the desired word.
The S Pen tracking dot will turn into a focus frame as it reads the word. A spinning green circle indicates it’s translating, and in just a second or two the translated word pops up. You’re only able to translate things one word at a time, so it may take some time to translate a large block of text, and sometimes the targeted word is not properly read by the phone, leading to some funky mistranslated words.
Those shortcomings aside, you’re able to translate to and from 37 different languages — mostly European. Korean, Chinese and Japanese are surprisingly absent, which is unfortunate, as the feature is only currently able to translate Latin-based languages.
Add Shortcuts
Because Air Command is so easy to get to, you may want to add your favorite apps so they’ll be instantly accessible as soon as you take out your S Pen. By default, there are four S Pen features in the Air Command menu, with a fifth option to add a shortcut.
Simply tap the “+” icon to browse through all the apps installed on your phone. There seems to be no limits to which app you can add to the Air Command menu, so you can set something for productivity or for fun. You’re able to add two shortcuts for a total of six Air Command launch icons. It’s entirely your call which apps you choose, and it’s also quick to swap apps out — just tap the Air Command settings icon in the bottom left corner.
In the Add Shortcuts menu, you’ll also see the other two Air Command features that aren’t set by default but might come in handy — Magnify and Glance.
Magnify
If you want an easy way to expand smaller text on your screen, but don’t like the idea of enlarging all the text on your phone, the Magnify option is the perfect alternative.
When added to the Air Command menu, it takes just a second to pop up a magnified window that expands text and images wherever you hover the S Pen over the screen. You’re still able to fully navigate around your phone with Magnify turned on, and you’re also able to change the magnification level quickly — from 150% up to 300% magnification.
Glance
Glance is the perfect tool for multitasking — it allows you to keep an app running in the bottom right corner of the screen and lets you quickly glance back at it simply by hovering the S Pen over the minimized window.
With the glance window expanded, you’re able to browse through the app — whether it’s looking at a news article or scanning through your emails. Then take the S Pen away from the screen and the app minimizes back down to the glance window in the corner.
This features is perfect if you’re transferring information from one app to another or otherwise need to bounce between two apps and don’t want to use the multi-window option. It’s a convenient feature that’s exclusively available to the Note 7 thanks to the power of the S Pen.
Note 7 owners, how are you using the S Pen? Let us know down in the comments!
BlackBerry brings whole productivity app suite to more Android phones
Last month, BlackBerry announced they would be bringing their Android apps such as the BlackBerry Hub, Calendar, and Password Keeper to even more Android users through a new subscription offering called Hub+.
Now, they have announced an expansion of that access adding even more of the productivity apps to the mix.
To understand how software is an integral part of BlackBerry’s DNA, look no further than the BlackBerry Hub and its associated productivity apps, which have consistently rated as one of the most popular features of both BlackBerry 10 and Priv. Software like the Hub is at the core of the quintessential BlackBerry experience, and is consistently rated as THE way to get more things done by enterprise users in every industry. Last month, we decided to bring that productivity to other platforms, extending Hub, Calendar, and Password Keeper to one billion people on Android through Hub+, a new subscription service.
We initially launched Hub+ as a free trial on Android Marshmallow, with only the Hub, Calendar, and Password Keeper available. Today, we are happy to announce the remainder of our productivity suite (Contacts, Tasks, Device Search, Notes, and Launcher) is now available to Android users for a free 30-day trial period and for just 99 cents a month.*
The BlackBerry Hub, Calendar, Password Keeper, and Launcher will continue to be available as part of a free, ad-supported offering.
Even better, we’ve officially expanded Hub+ access to smartphones running Android 5.0 Lollipop and lower-resolution smartphones running Android 6.0 Marshmallow! To ensure no technical issues for users, our initial list of Hub+-capable smartphones was limited by screen resolution, but that’s changed. As of today, more than 3,000 smartphone versions can run Hub+, and that number keeps growing. Note: Hub+ requires 2GB of RAM or more, and does not currently support tablets.
As BlackBerry rightfully notes, this opens the doors to a lot more Android users being able to access the fantastic apps that BlackBerry has to offer. To try out BlackBerry Hub+, go to the Google Play Store on your smartphone and search for BlackBerry Hub, then download the BlackBerry Hub+ Services app onto your phone. Once installed, you can click the Hub+ Services icon on your home screen, and tap “Apps by BlackBerry” to install the apps you wish to use.
More: BlackBerry DTEK50 review
Shoot for the moon with these lunar wallpapers
Fly me to the moon, let me play among the stars…
The stars might be too far away to dream of visiting, but the moon is so close. It’s right up there in the sky, almost every night. It’s taunting us as it twirls around the Earth in its near-monthly rotation. And even though most of us will never see it up-close, we’ll continue to reach for it every day… as the wallpaper on our phone!
It’s been a while since I featured a Trey Ratcliff, and I don’t know why, because his work is always out of this world. Winter may not be here yet, but it’s never too early to imagine some majestic snow-capped mountains, with a magic moon setting behind a pierced shroud of pale clouds….
The Super Moon Sets in Queenstown by Trey Ratcliff
Golden moons are magical things… well, they may be slightly less magical than childhood films like The Swan Princess led me to believe, but the golden glow of a harvest moon just seems more powerful, more awe-inducing. The definition of the ripples on the lake in this distance shot are spectacular, and if they have me humming Far Longer Than Forever, oh darn.
Harvest Moon by goldleaf09
While full moons may seem more wholesome and powerful, crescent moons are full of promise, full of mystery, full of secrets. They’re knife-thin Cheshire cat grins in the sky, waiting for a pair of bright eyes to blink into view above them. This wallpaper also helps put back into perspective how small the moon looks compared to our beautiful Earth thanks to this shot from Japanese astronaut Koichi Wakata.
Crescent Moon Rising and Earth’s Atmosphere by Koichi Wakata
Good night, Moon by Scott Kelly
Astronaut Scott Kelly got to spend a year on the International Space Station — something for which millions of nerds will forever envy him — and in that year of living in a weightless lab orbiting our blue marble, he had a lot of time to take freaking gorgeous pictures. Pictures like these! The Earth looks like a baby blue blanket getting ready to smother the moon, which is just out of its reach…
Good night, Moon by Scott Kelly
Three times the crescent moons, three times the mystery, three times the magic… it’s a shame this is all the way out on Saturn. Saturn has many, many moons, but here we have Titan, with its gaseous glow, rough Rhea with its icy craters, and mini Mimas at the bottom. Look at mini Mimas, it’s such a cute little moon! This wallpaper comes from the Cassini spacecraft, an unmanned spacecraft sent into Saturn’s orbit.
Triple Crescents by NASA
Apple will release MacOS Sierra update for Macs on 20 September
Apple quietly announced after its iPhone 7 event on Wednesday that MacOS Sierra will officially release for Macs later this month.
The Cupertino, CA-based company’s latest desktop operating system will start to roll out 20 September, according to its website. This is the first desktop OS to have Apple’s new naming scheme, and it marks the retirement of OS X. The idea is that MacOS will better align with WatchOS and tvOS, Apple’s operating systems for Apple Watch and the fourth-generation Apple TV, respectively.
On 8 September, Apple released the golden master (GM) build of MacOS Sierra. A GM is typically the final build of a piece of software in the beta stages for developers. In terms of MacOS, the GM build arrives shortly before the official release that’s delivered to consumers. Apple is pushing out the GM build two weeks after its seventh MacOS Sierra public beta and less than two weeks before the official release for consumers.
In other words: the MacOS Sierra golden master – if there are no critical bugs found – should be the same piece of software that most Mac owners can begin downloading later this month. If you’d like to try the GM, you must be a beta tester in Apple’s beta testing programme. You’ll receive the macOS Sierra golden master through the Software Update mechanism in the Mac App Store.
- Pocket-lint explained how to become a Sierra beta tester here
The MacOS Sierra is a major update with a number of new features, including Siri for the Mac, new Continuity features, and a “Universal Clipboard”. There’s also deeper iCloud integration, new Photos features, and an improved Messages app, among other things.
- Pocket-lint detailed many of Sierra’s new features here
Oculus Story Studios won its first Emmy for an interactive film
Virtual reality is an art form that’s still in its early stages. Headsets, like the Oculus Rift and HTC Vive, were only released this year, and people still need to be convinced that VR can be a powerful new way to tell and experience movies, TV shows, and video games. In what could be a tipping point for the VR industry, Facebook-owned Oculus won its first Emmy for Outstanding Original Interactive Program for its animated VR short film, Henry.
The movie, which is only available on the Oculus Rift, is about the titular, cute hedgehog — voiced by Elijah Wood — who likes to hug. It’s directed by Ramiro Lopez Dau, who previously worked on Monsters University and Cars 2. Henry is the first VR original to receive such a prestigious award, which was previously given to apps and online video projects, such as The Lizzie Bennet Diaries.
Creators are still figuring out how to produce full-length VR films that can rival a movie theater experience. But, this Emmy can be a big step forward for VR, and could help validate this technology as a legitimate tool for storytelling in the coming years.
Via: Variety
Source: Oculus
Welcome to the final console generation as we know it
PlayStation 4 architect Mark Cerny practically whispered into his microphone as he introduced the world to Sony’s latest console iteration, the PS4 Pro. His voice was at odds with the setting: He stood at the center of attention in a New York City auditorium packed with journalists and fans eager to hear about the latest and greatest Sony gaming technology. Amid frantic keyboard tapping and camera flashes, Cerny described the PS4 Pro’s upgrades like a museum curator detailing a magnificent piece of art he’d just acquired.
The Pro’s GPU is twice as fast as the standard PS4, it can handle PSVR out of the box, it has a 1TB hard drive, boosted clock rate, and it supports 4K and HDR gaming. Even some older games, including Shadow of Mordor and Infamous: First Light, will be patched to support 4K and HDR features in a move that Sony labels, “forward compatibility.”
Cerny called the PS4 Pro transformative, while PlayStation CEO Andrew House stressed that Sony wanted to ensure anyone playing on the new, beefed-up console would still be a part of the overall PS4 community.
“PS4 Pro is not intended to blur the lines between console generations,” Cerny said.
However, despite Sony’s best intentions, the PS4 Pro smudges this generational dividing line. Modern console generations have followed a fairly rigid pattern: standard console, “slim” console, rumors of a new console. Rinse and repeat for the next four to eight years.
Now, Sony and Microsoft have announced slimmer versions of the PS4 and Xbox One, but they’ve added another console iteration to the mix. Microsoft has Project Scorpio, a 4K, VR-ready console with juicier guts than the Xbox One. And Sony, of course, has the PS4 Pro.
Both of these consoles feel like a half-step forward. They aren’t part of a new console generation, but they are distinctly more powerful than their predecessors. It’s like Apple revealing the iPhone 6s a year after launching the iPhone 6. It’s like Alienware, Dell or HP announcing a new gaming PC: It’s fancier and faster, but it still plays all the games you already own.
These similarities to smartphone and PC upgrade cycles aren’t an accident. They’re a business plan.
“We think the future is without console generations,” head of Xbox games marketing Aaron Greenberg said in August. “We think that the ability to build a library, a community, to be able to iterate with the hardware — we’re making a pretty big bet on that with Project Scorpio. We’re basically saying, ‘This isn’t a new generation; everything you have continues forward and it works.’ We think of this as a family of devices.”
Even back in March, Xbox boss Phil Spencer compared the future of consoles to the PC market.
“We can effectively feel a little more like what we see on PC, where I can still go back and run my old Doom and Quake games that I ran so many years ago and still see the best new 4K games come out — and my whole library is always with me,” Spencer said.
Sony hasn’t been as open about its shift to a PC or smartphone approach to console generations, but it’s following Microsoft’s lead. In fact, it may be at the front of the pack: The PS4 Pro is scheduled to hit shelves a full year before Scorpio. The Pro lands on November 10th for $400, while Scorpio is due to land at the end of 2017.
This is not the end of consoles. It’s a moment of liberation. Microsoft and Sony can take advantage of faster iteration cycles to pump out more consoles, not fewer, though the changes in each new model may be incremental. (Maybe Valve was onto something with the Steam Machines after all.)
Despite Microsoft, Sony or Cerny’s intentions, console generations are definitely changing — but consoles themselves are not disappearing. The lines are just a little blurrier now.
Burritos by drone will soon be a thing
In the biggest test of drone deliveries to date, Google’s parent company Alphabet Inc. and Chipotle are bringing airborne burritos to the campus of Virginia Tech in Blacksburg, Virginia. According to Bloomberg, the trial runs start this month using Alphabet’s experimental Project Wing drones flying out of a Chipotle food truck.
The drones, which are all approved under the FAA’s new commercial guidelines, can fly autonomously but will have a human backup ready to take the controls if something goes awry. When a drone reaches the hungry customer on the other end of the delivery, it will hover in place while lowering the burrito payload to the ground using a winch. The project’s engineers will be testing everything from the drone’s navigation systems to customer satisfaction. After all, what good is a drone if it can only bring you a cold, mushy burrito?
While the concept seems simple, the data gathered from the project will actually help the FAA design a new system of low-altitude air traffic control that will be necessary once drone deliveries start catching on in earnest. As the director of the project partnership, Mark Blanks told Bloomberg, the lucky volunteers ordering the airlifted burritos will be a select group of users made up of “Virginia Tech employees, students and possibly other recruits.”
Source: Bloomberg
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