Best Buy to Offer AppleCare and AppleCare+ Starting September 13
Best Buy will begin offering AppleCare and AppleCare+ extended warranty plans for the iPhone, iPad, Mac, Apple Watch and other eligible Apple products across its U.S. stores starting September 13, according to an internal training video obtained by MacRumors. The news was first reported by 9to5Mac.
AppleCare and AppleCare+ purchased through Best Buy will include accidental damage coverage for the same service fees charged by Apple. The protection plans will also cover the accessories in the box and most other products on the same transaction, such as an Apple Display or AirPort Express purchased alongside an iMac.
Customers that purchase AppleCare or AppleCare+ can receive service at Best Buy or take their product directly to Apple. Best Buy will continue to offer revamped Geek Squad warranty plans for non-Apple products, including Geek Squad Protect & Support, Protect & Support Plus, 24/7 Support and Product Replacement.
Apple is expected to announce the next-generation “iPhone 6s” and “iPhone 6s Plus” within the first two weeks of September, with in-store availability usually occurring around one week later, so AppleCare and AppleCare+ should be available at Best Buy in time for the launch of those smartphones.
Apple Shares New Apple Music Ads: ‘All the Artists You Love and Are About to Love. All in One Place.’
Apple today released a series of three Apple Music ads focused on how the service helps users discover artists. The first ad is a 60-second spot highlighting a number of artists and sharing Apple’s motivation for creating Apple Music, ending with the tagline “All the artists you love and are about to love. All in one place.”
Music has never had a bigger place in our lives. To have access nearly all the music in world at our fingertips is remarkable. And yet, there needs to be a place where artists and fans can discover one another. Where the entire experience, from playlists to radio to new releases, is powered by people who live and breathe music. A place that brings you the artists you love, as well as the artists you’re about to love. That kind of place would be pretty great. And that’s what we set out to do with Apple Music.
Two other ads are artist-focused 30-second spots, with one featuring James Bay and the second featuring Kygo.
As with the longer general “Discovery” spot, the artist ads are shot in black and white and end with the new tagline, but the artist ads include no spoken content, focusing only on the artists’ work and then briefly overlaying a representation of their Apple Music pages with the Connect feature highlighted.
Apple is upgrading the Magic Mouse and Wireless Keyboard
To put it mildly, Apple’s input device roster hasn’t changed much in recent years. The Magic Mouse hasn’t really been touched since 2009, and the Wireless Keyboard is even older than that. The Cupertino crew must be ready to shake things up, though: regulatory filings for both a Magic Mouse 2 and an updated Wireless Keyboard have shown up at the FCC. It’s not certain how the external designs will change (there’s no peek at the top of either model), but they’re definitely going to get an internal upgrade. The peripherals are jumping from Bluetooth 2.0 to the more efficient Bluetooth 4.2 standard, and it looks like they may ditch AA batteries for built-in lithium-ion packs — you might not have to swap batteries ever again. While there aren’t any clues as to when Apple will deliver either the mouse or the keyboard, we won’t be shocked if the two show up alongside new Macs sometime later this year.
Filed under:
Peripherals, Apple
Via:
9to5Mac
Source:
FCC (Magic Mouse 2), (Wireless Keyboard)
Tags: apple, bluetooth, bluetooth4.2, fcc, keyboard, magicmouse, mouse, peripherals, wirelesskeyboard
New ‘Magic Mouse 2’ and Apple Wireless Keyboard With Bluetooth 4.2 Appear in FCC Filings
A group of filings posted to the U.S. Federal Communications Commission website yesterday (via SlashGear) reveal impending upgrades for Apple’s Magic Mouse and wireless keyboard accessories. Images accompanying the filings point to the Magic Mouse’s successor to simply be titled “Magic Mouse 2,” but no specific name for the new wireless keyboard has been revealed.
The internals of both devices will see a notable overhaul in their Bluetooth capabilities, with each device getting a bump from Bluetooth 2.1 to Bluetooth 4.2. The upgrade will bring about Apple accessories that should see a noticeable increase in battery life and more robust communication between the input devices and the main computer.
Also of note is the inclusion of integrated lithium battery packs, which users will have to charge instead of the swapping in traditional AA batteries as seen in the current generation of the Magic Mouse and Apple wireless keyboard. The change is noticeable on the wireless keyboard in particular, with Apple able to do away with the barrel shaped feature on the bottom of the existing keyboard where the replaceable AA batteries are housed.
Both the Magic Mouse 2 and wireless keyboard have undergone testing with “pre-production” builds of each device, so the possibility of a release sometime before or on Apple’s upcoming September iPhone media event may be likely.
Buyer’s Guide: Discounts on MacBook Air, iPad Air 2, Apple Accessories, and More
As we head into the middle of August, there are some recent deals available as retailers try to lure customers into their stores during the back to school shopping period. Best Buy is continuing to discount its entire line of iPad Air 2 models, and there are good deals on Apple’s lightweight, affordable MacBook Air.
iMac and Retina MacBook Pro sales are less impressive, so it may be best to wait a week or two to see if better discounts arise if you’re in search of one of those machines.
Apple’s Back to School promotion is still going on both in stores and online, with Apple offering a free pair of Beats Solo2 headphones with the purchase of an eligible Mac. Eligible Macs include the iMac, MacBook Air, MacBook Pro, MacBook, and Mac Pro.
As always, we’ve rounded up discounts on some useful Apple accessories and we’ve found plenty of deals on apps and games this week.
iPad Air 2
Best Buy is still discounting its selection of iPad Air 2 models this week, dropping prices from $75 to $100. The biggest discount is on the 128GB Cellular iPad Air 2 in Gold, Silver, and Space Gray, available for $729.99, the lowest price we’ve seen on that particular model.
The 16GB Wi-Fi only model is available for $449, the 64GB Wi-Fi model is available for $524.99, and the 128GB Wi-Fi model is available for $599.99, $100 off.
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Latest ruling from court turns back Samsung appeal in Apple lawsuit
Last month Samsung received some backing from major tech companies like Google, HP and Facebook in their ongoing patent lawsuit with Apple. The companies were hoping to help bolster Samsung’s case before the U.S. appellate court that too much emphasis was being placed on patents that constitute a tiny fraction of the whole when it comes to a smartphone. The argument is an important one to Samsung as they try to limit the damages owed to Apple that resulted from a court case in which it was ruled that Samsung had violated some of Apple’s patents. The appeals court has rejected this latest argument from Samsung.
A final ruling on the amount that Samsung owes to Apple is still pending before the district court. When Apple originally won the court case, they were awarded closet o $1 Billion in damages. Since then, Samsung has been whittling away at that amount through a series of appeals. The current potential payment owed sits at $548 million.
source: BBC
Come comment on this article: Latest ruling from court turns back Samsung appeal in Apple lawsuit
Comcast to launch its own YouTube rival called ‘Watchable’
Fresh off of its multi-million dollar investment in Vox and Buzzfeed, Comcast announced Friday it will be launching a digital video platform akin to YouTube in the coming weeks. According to Business Insider, the platform, called “Watchable” will be populated with non-exclusive, unlicensed, original content that will stream to users. Comcast has announced content-sharing partnerships with both Vox and Buzzfeed (obviously), as well as a host of other producers including AwesomenessTV, Refinery29, The Onion, Mic and Vice — even NBC Sports. The company has not yet released a complete list of partnerships as a number of them are still being finalized.
All this video is going to be curated and bundled up for the viewing pleasures of Comcast’s Xfinity X1 box owners (and the lucrative advertising potential they hold). The service will be set top-only at launch but will eventually migrate to iOS and Android apps as well. The company reportedly also plans to gradually swap out all current generation set top boxes with the new X1’s. These boxes allow users to stream content to their mobile devices as well as watch cable TV.
[Image Credit: Bloomberg via Getty Images]
Filed under:
Home Entertainment, Internet, Apple, Google
Source:
Business Insider
Tags: android, apple, buzzfeed, cable, Comcast, google, internet, ios, streaming, Television, vox, Xfinity
Apple in Discussions With Bay Area Test Track Focused on Self-Driving Cars
Apple’s work on its much-rumored Apple Car is progressing, and the company is said to be scouting for secure locations in the Bay Area where the vehicle can be tested, reports The Guardian. Engineers working on the car project are said to have met with officials at GoMentum Station in May to explore the site as a possible testing facility, suggesting work on the car may be further along than previously thought if there are already prototypes ready for testing.
GoMentum Station is a 2,100-acre former naval base run by the Contra Costa Transportation Authority that’s located in the East Bay, approximately an hour and a half from Apple’s Cupertino headquarters. The site, advertised as “the largest secure test facility in the world,” is used to test both Connected Vehicles and Autonomous Vehicles and is poised to become “the center of CV/AV research.”
In correspondence obtained by the Guardian under a public records act request, Apple engineer Frank Fearon wrote: “We would… like to get an understanding of timing and availability for the space, and how we would need to coordinate around other parties who would be using [it].” […]
In late May, Jack Hall, program manager for autonomous vehicles at GoMentum Station, wrote to Fearon to postpone a tour of the facility but noted: “We would still like to meet in order to keep everything moving and to meet your testing schedule.”
What’s most notable about today’s rumor from The Guardian, aside from the fact that the project is nearly to the prototype phase, is the site’s supposition that the vehicle is autonomous. Previous reports about the car, being developed under the code name “Project Titan,” have disagreed about whether the car is self-driving.
According to The Wall Street Journal, the car is electric but not autonomous, while Reuters has sources that say the project does indeed include self-driving cars. It’s possible that Apple is exploring both autonomous and non-autonomous electric vehicles under the car project, but Apple’s interactions with GoMentum Station don’t offer insight into the company’s plans as the site is for both autonomous and connected vehicles.
Over the last several months, details on Apple’s work on an electric car have been trickling out. Apple is said to have hundreds of employees working on the project, and has been recruiting many automotive experts. Apple has also reportedly met with several automobile manufacturers, and even went so far as to explore using the electric BMW i3 as the base for the Apple Car, though talks did not progress to the partnership stage.
Apple is rumored to be aiming to launch its Apple Car in 2020, giving it five years of development time. Of course, the car is still in the early testing stages, and Apple often tests products that never see the light of day. There’s a possibility that the Apple Car may never make it to market, even after years of testing, should Apple’s plans for the vehicle not pan out.
How to Recover Files, Contacts, Calendars and Reminders in iCloud
When iOS 8 was released, there was an iCloud Drive bug that caused many users to lose all of their documents that were stored in iCloud Drive. Apple fixed that issue, but there are still rare problems that pop up that can cause iCloud content to be erased, either through user error or through bugs in the operating system.
Following the iOS 8 iCloud Drive deletion snafu, Apple quietly introduced tools to recover deleted files from iCloud, and more recently, added a way to recover Contacts, Calendars, and Reminders, giving users a way to restore any lost content. This is a little known feature, but it’s good to know about if you run into an issue that wipes out content on your iOS device.
The first step is to log into iCloud on the web. These recovery tools are only available through iCloud.com. They are not present in the iCloud Settings app on iOS 8 or within the dedicated iCloud Drive app that’s available in iOS 9.
To log into iCloud.com:
- Visit iCloud.com in a web browser of choice, such as Safari or Chrome.
- Enter your Apple ID and password.
- If you have two-factor authentication turned on, you’ll need a trusted device to generate a code to log into iCloud and access the settings.
To access the recovery settings:
- Click on the “Settings” app in the main iCloud menu.
- Scroll down to the bottom of the page until you get to the “Advanced” section.”
- Click on the content you need to restore. Options are files stored in iCloud Drive, a list of contacts, or your Calendar and Reminders.
Restoring files:
Using the “Restore Files” option on iCloud.com brings up a list of all files that have been deleted over the past 30 days. It includes files from apps that support iCloud Drive, such as Pixelmator, Napkin, and Byword.
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Seagate Review: Hands-On With the 4TB Backup Plus Portable Hard Drive With Lyve Integration
Seagate has long sold a line of Backup Plus external hard drives that offer large amounts of storage space at a reasonable price, and in June, the company announced two new features added to all hard drives in the Backup Plus line: 200GB of Microsoft OneDrive cloud storage and the Lyve photo and video management app for automatically backing up photos.
Seagate also announced a new high capacity Backup Plus Portable hard drive, with 4TB of storage and a 20.5mm form factor, priced at $240. Seagate invited us to test out its newest hard drive to test the Backup Plus hard drive and the new Lyve app and service it ships with.
Seagate’s new Backup Plus offers the same 4TB of storage that the Backup Plus Fast offers, but it’s less expensive and it is a single 4TB hard drive instead of two external drives in a RAID 0 configuration. It’s also got more storage than the Backup Plus Slim, which caps out at 2TB, allowing Seagate’s newest offering to fill a void between the two existing products (Fast and Slim) in the Backup Plus family.
Design and Features
Seagate’s been selling its Backup Plus line for years. Design wise, the 4TB Backup Plus looks like any standard 2.5-inch portable hard drive. It measures in at 4.5 inches in length, 3.1 inches in width, it’s .807 inches thick (20.5mm), and it weighs 0.54 pounds. In terms of usability, those dimensions mean it’s slim and easy to slip into a bag or a backpack.
The Backup Plus has a traditional black casing that’s half metal and half plastic, with the metal plate located on the front of the drive. An LED on the front lights up when the hard drive is plugged in, and there’s a single USB port on one side.
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