iHome’s iSP5 SmartPlug Is Far From Perfect, But It’s a Cheap Way to Give HomeKit a Try
iHome’s iSP5 SmartPlug is one of the first five HomeKit-compatible devices on the market, and it’s the most affordable option for Apple users who are looking to try out the company’s home automation platform. The SmartPlug is a simple device that plugs right into any outlet, transforming any appliance – from lights to fans – into an iPhone-controlled Siri-compatible smart product using WiFi.
We tested out three of iHome’s SmartPlugs, simulating what it might be like to control lights and fans across multiple rooms to turn an ordinary home with ordinary outlets into a smart home with a reasonable monetary investment and a bit of time.
As with the Elgato Eve review I did earlier this summer, using the iHome SmartPlugs makes it clear that there are still a lot of issues that need to be resolved with HomeKit and Apple’s HomeKit partner companies, but at the $40 price point, I can recommend the SmartPlug to anyone curious about HomeKit who has the patience to deal with bugs that can range from minor inconveniences to frustrations that make you want to toss your SmartPlug across the room in anger.
Hardware Overview
The iSP5 SmartPlug is a no-frills device that plugs into any outlet within the home to transform it into a WiFi-connected outlet. Each SmartPlug connects individually to a home’s WiFi network, so a central bridge is not required. SmartPlugs are rectangular in shape and fairly compact — small enough that two can be plugged in next to each other in a single 120v wall outlet.
Setting up the SmartPlugs is as simple as plugging them in and downloading the iHome Control app. From there, a WiFi network needs to be confirmed within the app and the HomeKit code supplied with each SmartPlug needs to be entered to register the devices with HomeKit and an iCloud account.
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iHome’s iSP5 SmartPlug Is Far From Perfect, But It’s a Cheap Way to Give HomeKit a Try
iHome’s iSP5 SmartPlug is one of the first five HomeKit-compatible devices on the market, and it’s the most affordable option for Apple users who are looking to try out the company’s home automation platform. The SmartPlug is a simple device that plugs right into any outlet, transforming any appliance – from lights to fans – into an iPhone-controlled Siri-compatible smart product using WiFi.
We tested out three of iHome’s SmartPlugs, simulating what it might be like to control lights and fans across multiple rooms to turn an ordinary home with ordinary outlets into a smart home with a reasonable monetary investment and a bit of time.
As with the Elgato Eve review I did earlier this summer, using the iHome SmartPlugs makes it clear that there are still a lot of issues that need to be resolved with HomeKit and Apple’s HomeKit partner companies, but at the $40 price point, I can recommend the SmartPlug to anyone curious about HomeKit who has the patience to deal with bugs that can range from minor inconveniences to frustrations that make you want to toss your SmartPlug across the room in anger.
Hardware Overview
The iSP5 SmartPlug is a no-frills device that plugs into any outlet within the home to transform it into a WiFi-connected outlet. Each SmartPlug connects individually to a home’s WiFi network, so a central bridge is not required. SmartPlugs are rectangular in shape and fairly compact — small enough that two can be plugged in next to each other in a single 120v wall outlet.
Setting up the SmartPlugs is as simple as plugging them in and downloading the iHome Control app. From there, a WiFi network needs to be confirmed within the app and the HomeKit code supplied with each SmartPlug needs to be entered to register the devices with HomeKit and an iCloud account.
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The traditional flagship is sinking, but don’t count it out just yet
Perhaps the game isn’t over yet, but the $800 flagship is running out of health points.
Smartphones are getting cheaper all the time. Sales of high-end $700 or $800 flagships are generally declining. More people are bypassing carriers and buying directly from OEMs, or picking up unlocked devices from online retailers. Could we be looking at the end of the traditional, expensive flagship phone? Can Samsung, LG, or even Apple keep asking us to pay big bucks for their latest offerings?
What’s going on?
If you look at the last round of flagship releases it’s difficult to see where the innovation is. We haven’t seen many compelling new features in the last few years. The flagship line-up has started to look pretty homogenous and almost everyone owns a smartphone now. When the market stagnates, one of the few remaining options for manufacturers looking to stand out is to drop prices.
People have learned that affordable phones don’t feel necessarily cheap.
The average selling price for an Android phone has plummeted from $441 in 2010 down to $254 last year. That’s partly because of the abundance of budget Android smartphones on the market. The platform has improved and hardware has reduced in price dramatically over the last few years. Budget phones are now perfectly usable, and some mid-range offerings, in terms of price, are competing with the high-end flagships, in terms of specs.
If we take a look at something like the OnePlus 2, which starts at $329, we can see the pressure in the market. It’s not really “the 2016 flagship killer” OnePlus suggests, but it doesn’t look out of place next to this year’s crop.
Price drops come quickly
It used to be that flagships would be sold for nearly a full year at the release price, or very close to it. The prices would only start to drop within a month of the next version in the series, but nowadays they begin to fall pretty quickly after release. The LG G4 has dropped from $600 to $480 on T-Mobile and $470 unlocked on Amazon. You can pick up a Galaxy S6 or S6 Edge for $550 now. The Nexus 6 has dropped to $500 from Google and $490 on Amazon now.
No room for yesteryear’s smartphones where we’re going.
This is yet another reason not to lock yourself into a two-year contract and pull the trigger on the latest flagship on release day. You quickly end up in a negative equity situation, but you’ve still got to pay your smartphone off at the original inflated price.
What are the pros and cons?
There’s really only one big pro that matters – cheaper smartphones for all. But it’s also potentially great for customers to be able to shop around on carriers. In theory, it should drive them to offer better deals for service.
For manufacturers, there’s really only one big con that matters – reduced profits. But is that bad for consumers? You could argue that it will lead to a reduction in R&D, maybe there’s a knock-on impact in terms of reduced innovation, but that could also be self-defeating for the OEMs.
Together, and often the same.
Bucking the trend
There will always be a minority of people willing to pay top dollar for the latest thing. Realistically, that’s based on a mixture of alluring hardware and effective marketing. Looking around for an exception to the dwindling profit rule, Apple is an obvious elephant in the room.
Even the average selling price of the iPhone has declined since 2010. It has gone from $702 to $657 in 2014. But for the most part Apple still fits the old model. It sells its flagship at a premium price and only discounts when the next version is released. The fact it has its own exclusive platform, a strong brand, and high customer satisfaction and loyalty are just some of the reasons.
It’s difficult to argue the demise of the traditional flagship in the face of the iPhone’s continued success, but the Android smartphone market is clearly a different beast.
Can Apple buck the trend indefinitely?
Shifting strategies
We’ve seen a couple of strategies to try and combat this general demise from Samsung, the master of the multi-pronged approach. Two of them look like they might have legs.
First, the trend towards bigger displays as phablets take off has largely been driven by the success of Samsung’s Galaxy Note series. People seem to be willing to pay more for bigger devices and phablets are taking over as the new flagships. LG went as far as to merge the two, with the G3 and G4 being clear flagships that are also phablet sized. Apple jumped on that bandwagon too, because the 6 Plus is clearly superior to the standard iPhone 6.
Second, the innovative curved display design of the S6 Edge led to better sales than anticipated. Apparently, Samsung expected the normal S6 to outsell the Edge significantly, but it didn’t. Considering the Edge was also more expensive at release, there’s clearly still a hunger for sexy new devices that innovate. It will be interesting to see what happens with the S6 Edge+ as it combines both trends and is now the most expensive smartphone in Samsung’s line-up.
Samsung has an Edge over the competition, but for how long?
Still kicking
There definitely is a decline in the traditional flagship phone model. We can see it clearest if we look at something like the HTC One M9. Manufacturers can’t get away with releasing the same phone as last year, no matter how gorgeous the design may be. People want some new features or design tweaks they can clearly identify, even if they are a bit puffed up by the marketing department, or balanced with steps backwards in other areas.
Flagship territory and pricing has also been an uphill struggle for Sony. And none of the up and coming field in the OEM charts, including Lenovo (and Motorola), Huawei, Xiaomi, ZTE, and Alcatel sell phones in the $700 or $800 price bracket.
Having said all that, there’s still room for a sizeable niche of premium-priced phones that offer a mixture of cutting edge features, gorgeous design, and clever marketing. The traditional flagship may be sinking, but you can’t count it out just yet.
Beats 1 Lead Executive Ian Rogers Leaves Apple
Apple Music senior director and former Beats Music CEO Ian Rogers has resigned from Apple nearly two months after the launch of Apple’s streaming music service, the company confirmed to the Financial Times today.
Rogers was among a group of executives that joined Apple last year when the iPhone maker acquired Beats for $3 billion. Rogers’s official title was Senior Director of Apple Music, a position he held since August 2014, according to his LinkedIn profile.
Rogers, who served as Beats Music CEO between January 2013 and August 2014, departed Apple to join an undisclosed “Europe-based company in an unrelated industry” on the west coast. He is credited for hiring Beats 1 DJ Zane Lowe, who worked at BBC Radio 1 from 2002 to 2015.
Beats 1 is a 24/7 streaming radio station built into Apple Music, featuring a mix of the latest music and guest appearances from artists such as Drake, Dr. Dre, The Weeknd, Eminem, Pharrell Williams and others.
Apple becomes the second-biggest wearables maker, behind Fitbit
The big question surrounding the Apple Watch is how well it’s selling, but Apple isn’t saying just yet. Without concrete numbers, we’re forced to turn to various projections — and one of the more reliable sources says that Apple’s first wearable is doing well. According to IDC, Apple shipped 3.6 million Apple Watches during the second quarter of 2015; that’s good for second place in the global wearables market, behind market leader Fitbit.
Fitbit shipped about 4.4 million wearables in the quarter, a huge increase over the 1.7 million it moved a year ago. But due to the emergence of Apple and Xiaomi (which shipped 3.1 million wearables in Q2), Fitbit’s market share slipped from over 30 percent down to 24.3 percent. Overall, Fitbit, Apple and Xiaomi were the top three manufacturers, with Garmin and Samsung rounding out the top five. The emergence of Apple and Xiaomi combined with Fitbit’s gains contributed to overall market growth of 232 percent year-over-year. Outside the top five, IDC’s “other” manufacturers category grew from 2.6 million to 5.7 million, a clear sign that companies big and small are taking advantage of this new market category.
Apple’s position looks even stronger when you look at devices it more directly competes with — IDC has a “smart wearables” category that tracks devices capable of installing third-party apps. In that segment of the market, the Apple Watch dominates: IDC estimates that two out of three smart wearables shipped in the quarter came from Apple. That’s despite the fact that the Watch sits at the high end of the price spectrum. There’s likely some post-launch excitement that drove those numbers, so we’ll have to wait and see if Watch sales keep growing throughout the year. Cook said on Apple’s recent earnings call that sales of the Watch were accelerating post-launch. How long that trend can continue remains to be seen.
Source:
IDC
Tags: apple, applewatch, fitbit, idc, sales, shipments, SmartWatch, watch, wearables, xiaomi
Boostcase Review: Bloc Power Bank for Apple Watch Has Unique Built-In Battery, but Isn’t Portable Enough
Just months after the Apple Watch was released, there are dozens if not hundreds of different stand options available on the market. The Bloc Power Bank from Boostcase stands out due to its unique long, flat shape and the fact that it has a built-in battery pack that can charge the Apple Watch while on the go.
Made from solid aluminum, the Bloc Power Bank comes in Silver, Space Gray, Gold, Rose Gold, Wood, and Stainless Steel, to match all of the different Apple Watch options that are available. I went hands-on with the silver aluminum model to see how it measures up to other available stands on the market and whether the built-in battery is a useful function.
Design and Setup
As with all Apple Watch stands, the Bloc is designed to work with the charging cable that ships with the Apple Watch, and thus it does not include a built-in charging cable. Size wise, the Bloc is just under 10 inches long, just over half an inch thick, and two inches wide. It weighs 408 grams, or 0.90 pounds with both the battery pack attached and the Apple Watch charger in place.
If you’re thinking that sounds both unwieldy and heavy, that’s a correct assumption. At 10 inches long and nearly a pound in weight, the Bloc isn’t exactly what I’d call portable, because it’s not going to fit comfortably in a backpack or a purse. Since it’s flat and rectangular, the Bloc can only be used with open-loop bands like the Sport Band, the Modern Buckle, and the Classic Buckle.
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Instagram Announces In-App Support for Portrait and Landscape Modes
Instagram today announced that the popular app would begin letting users post photos and videos in both portrait and landscape modes, expanding upon the all-inclusive square format for which the service is well-known. The company notes it discovered that nearly one in five posts aren’t in the square format, so today’s decision comes from its mission statement of putting each user’s “visual story” first and the format second.
Square format has been and always will be part of who we are. That said, the visual story you’re trying to tell should always come first, and we want to make it simple and fun for you to share moments just the way you want to.
It turns out that nearly one in five photos or videos people post aren’t in the square format, and we know that it hasn’t been easy to share this type of content on Instagram: friends get cut out of group shots, the subject of your video feels cramped and you can’t capture the Golden Gate Bridge from end to end.
Now, when choosing a photo or video, you can tap the format icon to adjust the orientation to portrait or landscape instead of square. Once you share the photo, the full-sized version of it will appear to all of your followers in feed in a beautiful, natural way.
The company believes that the update makes videos “more cinematic than ever” thanks to widescreen, and that instead of a segregated selection of filters for photos and videos, now all filters can be used on any type of moment. The update is live now and should be rolling out to all Instagram users today. Those who have yet to download Instagram [Direct Link] from the App Store can do so for free.
Belkin Launches MIXIT Lightning to USB Keychain Chargers
Belkin announced today that it has introduced a new lineup of Lightning to USB clip-on fashion accessories in time for the back to school season. The new MIXIT charging cables for iPhone, iPad and iPod touch are available now in three designs: a leather tassel, a braided USB clip and a metallic keychain.
The MIXIT Lightning to USB Tassel has a chic design made from natural leather and clips onto a bag, purse or luggage for on-the-go use. The accessory is designed to hide the Lightning and USB connectors behind the tassel cords, available in four different colors: fog, camel, coral and black. The 2.4A charging cable is approximately 7 inches long.
The MIXIT Lightning to USB Clip is a more simplistic accessory with a metallic keychain and soft cover that slides down to protect the Lightning to USB connector. The 2.4A charger has a braided cable with a multicolored weave and a color-matched mounting loop, sliding cover and cable connector heads. The clip is available in four color combinations.
The MIXIT Lightning to USB Keychain has a metallic loop at the top with an aluminum body that houses a Lightning to USB connector that rotates 360 degrees for charging from all angles and added protection. The 2.4A charger also bends up to 90 degrees itself and is available in five colors: fog, silver, gold, pink and blue.
MIXIT charging cables can be purchased from Belkin’s website and Target for $34.99 each.
Obi Worldphone, headed by former Apple CEO, announces two new budget phones
Obi Worldphone, the company launched by former Apple and Pepsi CEO John Sculley, today announced two new budget Android phones. The silicon valley is joining Motorola in bucking the trend that high quality budget phones must come out of China by announcing the SF1 and SJ1.5 which are both prices under $200. The phones are the first two handsets announced by Obi Worldphone and will target expanding markets in Asia, Africa and the Middle East.
The phones were designed by San Francisco firm Ammunition and focus on an iconic industrial design and a custom user interface, also designed by Ammunition, that unifies the hardware and software experience according to Obi Worldphone.
The SF1 has a raised 5 inch, 1080p display with Gorilla Glass 4 covering it all. It will come with either 2 gb of ram and 16 gb of storage or 3 gb of ram and 32 gb of storage depending on which version you select. It will be powered by a Qualcomm Snapdragon 615 SoC and a 3,000 mAh battery. Rounding out the specs are a fiberglass body and metal accents, micro SD card slot, a 5 MP front facing camera and 13 MP rear facing main camera. The SF1 will run you about $200
The SJ1.5 is cheaper at $129 and will still maintain the 5″ display but will only be 720p. Instead of the Qualcomm chip it will feature a quad-core MediaTek MT6580 processor, dual sim slots like it’s big brother and 16 GB of storage. The SJ1.5 will offer “unique color and accent options” as well as an 8 MP rear facing camera and 5 MP selfie cam and be powered by the same 3,000 mAh battery.
How do you think these new phones look? Do you see any influences by phones currently on the market or is this a few new design?
Source: Obi Worldphone via AndroidAuthority
The post Obi Worldphone, headed by former Apple CEO, announces two new budget phones appeared first on AndroidGuys.
Apple Invites Media to September 9 Event: ‘Hey Siri, Give Us a Hint’
As predicted in August, Apple is planning to hold a media event on Wednesday, September 9 at the Bill Graham Civic Auditorium in San Francisco, California. Media invites were sent out today, with Yahoo’s Alyssa Bereznak sharing the first look at the artwork and tagline for the invitations: “Hey Siri, give us a hint.”
Image via The Loop
This year’s iPhone-centric event is expected to see the debut of the next-generation iPhone 6s and iPhone 6s Plus, which, according to rumors, will include a reinforced body constructed from stronger 7000 Series aluminum, Force Touch, an A9 processor, 2GB RAM, and an improved camera.
Rumors have also suggested Apple will use the event to unveil the next-generation Apple TV, a major update from the existing set-top box. It will include a redesigned chassis with an A8 processor, more storage space, and a touch-based remote control, along with a new software system that includes Siri support and a full App Store.
We’ll also get an update on the launch dates of iOS 9 and watchOS 2, and shortly after the event ends, we may see golden master software releases for the two software updates ahead of their final public launch.
In line with past events, the September 9 iPhone unveiling will begin at 10:00 a.m. Pacific Time. Apple has not yet confirmed whether the event will be live streamed on its website and through the Apple TV, but it is likely details on a live stream will be announced a few days ahead of the event.
Update: Siri itself is also getting in on the festivities with some witty responses.
AIVAnet 