Quad-Core 2012 Mac Mini Mysteriously Reappears on Apple’s U.S. Online Store
Apple today has mysteriously added back a 2012 model Mac mini to the Apple Online Store for $699. The over two-year-old machine still has the same hardware specifications as it did in 2012, including a 2.3GHz quad-core Intel Core i7 processor, 4GB of RAM and Intel HD Graphics 4000. The listing also shows that the computer ships with OS X Mavericks installed.
It is unknown if the outdated Mac mini has mistakenly resurfaced on the Apple Online Store, or if Apple intentionally reintroduced the model on its website. One plausible reason that Apple may be making this older Mac mini available for purchase again is to provide customers with a quad-core option, as the existing 2014 models are each powered by dual-core Intel Core i5 processors.
The entry-level Mac is listed as out of stock in the United States, and MacRumors could not find the model listed for sale elsewhere after spot checks of the Apple Online Store in Canada, United Kingdom, Australia, Japan and several other countries. Apple still offers a refurbished version of the same 2012 Mac mini for $589 on its website, although that model is also currently out of stock.
‘Pushbullet’ Brings Notification Syncing and Easy File Transfers to iOS, Mac, and Safari [iOS Blog]
Pushbullet has long been one of the more popular third-party solutions for keeping notifications, links, photos and other files in sync between a smartphone or tablet and computer, although one important feature it has lacked until now is support for Apple devices. The wait is over, however, as Pushbullet announced today the availability of full iPhone, iPad and Mac support alongside a new Safari extension.
Pushbullet is the marriage of AirDrop, Notifyr and other features in one single package. First and foremost, the software enables iOS notifications to be pushed to Mac and dismissed remotely from Notification Center on iPhone. The app also has drag-and-drop functionality for sharing photos between devices and the ability to copy and paste links from Mac to iPhone using the newly available Safari extension.
The app utilizes Bluetooth LE to allow iOS notifications to be seen, acted on and dismissed from a Mac, with customizable per-app settings to fine-tune the experience to your liking. Pushbullet is now officially a cross-platform too as well, meaning that you can view your Android notifications right on your Mac desktop without taking your smartphone out of your pocket. Likewise, you can copy and paste links to your Android device using the Safari extension.
Pushbullet developer Ryan Olzenburg claims that iOS notifications cannot be pushed to Windows yet, but says to stay tuned for further updates. Pushbullet for iOS [Direct Link], Pushbullet for Mac [Direct Link] and the Safari extension are all free to download. If you use a different browser, extensions are available for Chrome, Firefox and Opera as well. We’ll be going hands-on with Pushbullet soon.
Apple Reports Record Earnings and iPhone Sales: $18B Profit on $74.6B in Revenue for Q1 2015
Apple today announced financial results for the first fiscal quarter of 2015, which corresponds to the fourth calendar quarter of 2014. For the quarter, Apple posted revenue of $74.6 billion and net quarterly profit of $18 billion, or $3.06 per diluted share, compared to revenue of $57.6 billion and net quarterly profit of $13.1 billion, or $1.98 per diluted share, in the year-ago quarter.
Gross margin for the quarter was 39.9 percent compared to 37.9 percent in the year-ago quarter, with international sales accounting for 65 percent of revenue. Apple also declared an upcoming dividend payment of $0.47 per share, payable on February 9 to shareholders of record as of February 12. The company currently holds $178 billion in cash and marketable securities.
Apple sold a record 74.5 million iPhones during the quarter, up from 51 million a year earlier, while Mac sales were also strong with 5.5 million units sold, up from 4.8 million units in the year-ago quarter. iPad sales were down, however, falling to 21.4 million from 26 million.
“We’d like to thank our customers for an incredible quarter, which saw demand for Apple products soar to an all-time high,” said Tim Cook, Apple’s CEO. “Our revenue grew 30 percent over last year to $74.6 billion, and the execution by our teams to achieve these results was simply phenomenal.”
Apple’s guidance for the second quarter of fiscal 2015 includes expected revenue of $52-55 billion and gross margin between 38.5 and 39.5 percent.
Apple will provide live streaming of its fiscal Q1 2015 financial results conference call at 2:00 PM Pacific, and MacRumors will update this story with coverage of the conference call highlights.
Conference Call and Q&A Highlights are available in reverse chronological order after the jump. Read more 
Apple Pay Responsible for Two of Every Three Contactless Payments on Visa, MasterCard, and American Express [iOS Blog]
Since its introduction in October, Apple Pay has accounted for two of every three dollars spent through contactless payments on Visa, Mastercard, and American Express, according to Apple CEO Tim Cook who shared the information during the company’s earnings call for the first fiscal quarter of 2015.
“Apple Pay is off to a very strong start,” said Cook, adding that he expects 2015 to be “the year of Apple Pay.” About 750 banks and credit unions have signed on to accept Apple Pay, and according to numbers shared by Cook, Apple Pay was responsible for 80 percent of mobile payments at Panera Bread, and at Whole Foods, mobile payments increased by 400 percent.
Earlier information has also pointed to Apple Pay’s success. Apple Pay had more than 1 million card activations during the first 72 hours Apple Pay was available, and in November, Apple Pay captured a total of 1 percent of all digital payment dollars.
Thus far, Apple Pay has proven to be most popular at Whole Foods, with the speciality grocery store responsible for 20 percent of all Apple Pay transactions and 28 percent of all Apple Pay spending. Walgreens and McDonald’s were also popular with Apple Pay users.
Apple Pay is still in its infancy, limited to the United States. In the coming months, Apple plans to expand to several other locations across Europe, Canada, and Asia. In the United States, Apple Pay now supports cards representing 90 percent of U.S. credit card purchase volume.
iOS 8.1.3 Fixes Exploits Used by TaiG Jailbreak [iOS Blog]
It appears that today’s iOS 8.1.3 update fixes many of the exploits that were used for the iOS 8 TaiG jailbreak, which worked up until iOS 8.1.2. The earlier Pangu jailbreak was disabled with the iOS 8.1.1 update that was released on November 17.
TaiG has not yet confirmed whether iOS 8.1.3 breaks its jailbreak tool, but reports on the MacRumors forums and on Twitter suggest that is indeed the case. Apple’s support document detailing the security fixes in iOS 8.1.3 credits the TaiG jailbreak team for four vulnerability fixes.
At the current time, Apple is still signing iOS 8.1.2 so it’s possible to downgrade from iOS 8.1.3 back to iOS 8.1.2 or upgrade to iOS 8.1.2 from an earlier version of iOS, but that could end at any time.
Released this morning, iOS 8.1.3 includes a range of bug fixes including a repair for a lingering Wi-Fi issue, and it also reduces the amount of storage space required to perform an iOS update.
iPhone 6 and 6 Plus Brought More Android Switchers, New Customers Than Prior Models
During today’s earnings call covering the first fiscal quarter of 2015, Apple CEO Tim Cook was asked about the sales split between the 4.7-inch iPhone 6 and the 5.5-inch iPhone 6 Plus. He declined to provide specific numbers on the split, but he did confirm that the iPhone 6 was the most popular device.
“Obviously to sell 74.5 million devices, they were all popular,” Cook said. “Both did incredibly well. We’re really proud of them, along with the iPhone 5s and 5c.”
According to Cook, there was some clear geographical preference for the iPhone 6 vs the iPhone 6 Plus. Some locations skewed higher to iPhone 6 Plus preference, while others preferred the iPhone 6. He didn’t specify which regions preferred which devices, but data has suggested Asian countries favored the iPhone 6 Plus.
During the call, Cook also mentioned that the iPhone 6 and 6 Plus brought the highest Android switcher rate over the course of the last three years and that there’s still a lot of opportunity to see growth as only a “small fraction” of existing iPhone users (in the low teens) have upgraded to a new device. The iPhone 6 and 6 Plus have brought the highest number of customers new to iPhone than in any prior iPhone launch. “We saw more new customers to iPhone than we’ve ever seen before,” said Cook.
Cook said the company is getting “great feedback” about the quality of the products that they’re shipping, and that in emerging markets, iPhone growth was “absolutely stunning.” The company is very bullish on the iPhone going forward, expecting to see a lot of new adopters in Q2 2015 as well.
“We believe that it’s the best smartphone in the world,” said Cook.
Apple managed to reach supply/demand balance on the iPhone 6 and iPhone 6 Plus in January, when shipping dates finally hit 24 hours. Before that, iPhone supplies remained somewhat constrained throughout the holiday season.
Today’s earnings report revealed record iPhone sales, at 74.5 million, or 46 percent growth year over year. The iPhone makes up an impressive 69 percent of Apple’s revenue, which hit $74.6B during the quarter.
Tim Cook: Apple Watch on Schedule to Ship in April [iOS Blog]
During today’s earnings call covering the first fiscal quarter of 2015, Apple CEO Tim Cook shared some new details on the prospective launch date of the Apple Watch. According to Cook, Apple Watch development is currently on schedule, and the company is planning to ship the device in April.
Development for Apple Watch is right on schedule, and we expect to begin shipping in April.
When the Apple Watch was announced, Apple gave a vague “Early 2015″ launch date for the device, making it unclear when it would actually ship. Several rumors recently pointed towards a March launch date for the device, but it appears it will actually begin shipping out to consumers a month later, in April.
Now that we know when the Apple Watch is expected to launch, the only unknowns about the device are battery life and its cost. Rumors have suggested that battery life will be somewhat disappointing, lasting approximately 19 hours during “mixed use.”
Cost is also up in the air, aside from a known starting price of $349 for the lower-end device. Pricing on the middle tier version is unclear, as is pricing for the high-end gold Apple Watch, which rumors suggest could sell for thousands of dollars.
Tim Cook: Apple Has Sold More Than 1 Billion iOS Devices [iOS Blog]
Apple CEO Tim Cook confirmed on Tuesday during the company’s quarterly earnings call that it has sold more than 1 billion iOS devices to date since launching the original iPhone over seven years ago. According to Cook, the impressive milestone, which accounts for the iPhone, iPad and iPod touch, was reached in December and was helped along by a record-breaking 74.5 million iPhones sold in Q1 2015.
Cook emphasized that iPhone 6 and iPhone 6 Plus demand was stronger than any other iPhone it has ever released, selling at a pace of roughly 34,000 devices per hour. The success of the iPhone 6 and iPhone 6 Plus was aided by the widest international rollout of an iOS device to date, with the smartphone launching in more places than ever before and in a total of 130 countries.
1 Billion iOS devices shipped!!
— Philip Schiller (@pschiller) January 27, 2015
Apple’s revenues soar thanks to iPhones and China
Well, it’s that time again. Apple has just released its latest batch of quarterly earnings, and wouldn’t you know it — the folks in Cupertino once again sold more iPhones than it has in any other quarter. We’re talking 74.5 million phones changing hands since October, up just about 50 percent from its last utterly insane holiday quarter. Apple doesn’t break down sales numbers by model, but its smartphones’ bang-up performance helped push company revenue to new heights; the company raked in a cool $74.6 billion in revenue, along with $18 billion in pure profit. That is crazy.
So the iPhones did extremely, ridiculously well – what about iPads? Apple only sold about 21.4 million, and while that’s not exactly a number to sneeze at, it’s significantly lower than the more than 26 million the company moved during the last holiday season. There are plenty of possible culprits here, from the less-than-game-changing upgrades the iPad Air and Mini lines received earlier this year, to the growth in demand for the iPhone 6 Plus, a device that not only closes the gap between phone and tablet, but also nets Apple more cash than the bog-standard 6. That sort of dip in performance doesn’t come out of the blue though — we saw it last quarter too, a phenomenon CEO Tim Cook referred to as a “speed bump”.
Bear in mind, we all expected this quarter to be a blow-out. After all, the last few months represent the first full quarter of sales for the company’s new iPhones and iPads, a big push into the holiday buying maelstrom and a more aggressive mobile stance in China. As usual, people are fingering that last, region-specific reason as a big, big reason for that growth. A quick look at Apple’s data reveals why: Greater China accounted for about $16 billion of the company’s overall revenue over the past three-ish months. That’s just about twice the number the region put up last year, making it only slightly less valuable than Apple’s business in Europe. Factor in a new report from analysis firm Canalys proclaiming Apple the victor in Chinese smartphone sales (beating Xiaomi, Samsung and Huawei in that order) and it’s not hard to see just how crucial China is to Apple’s future growth.
Noticeably absent from this first information blast is any word on Apple Pay, which is – among other things – is being baked into some 200,000 self-serve kiosks across the United States. Apple gets a tiny cut from each Pay transaction that gets processed, which could ultimately mean big bucks falling into the company’s coffers when phone and tablet sales slip into slightly more reasonable territory. Here’s hoping it’ll get a detailed shout-out in the customary earnings call, set to kick off shortly.
Filed under: Mobile
Source: BusinessWire
How to Watch Super Bowl XLIX on Your iPad or Computer [iOS Blog]
Super Bowl XLIX is airing this Sunday, with the New England Patriots facing off against the Seattle Seahawks. If you don’t have a cable subscription, you might be worried about missing the game — but rest easy, there are several ways to watch if you have an iPad, computer, or Verizon iPhone.
We’ve outlined all of the ways you can catch the Super Bowl in the video below, and we’ve also got a walkthrough complete with links in this post.
iPad and iPod touch
NBC is running a promotion called “Super Stream Sunday” that will let all U.S.-based users watch 11 continuous hours of NBC content through the NBC Sports Live Extra app on the iPad or iPod touch.
The app normally requires a cable subscription and authentication to log in, but beginning at noon Eastern Time on February 1, the login requirements will be eliminated. NBC’s Super Stream Sunday will include the full game, the halftime show with Katy Perry, and pre- and post-game shows.
Apple TV users can use AirPlay mirroring to watch content from their iPads on their televisions.
The NBC Sports Live Extra app can be downloaded from the App Store for free. [Direct Link]
Mac/PC
Super Stream Sunday also extends to Macs and PCs, which can be used to watch the Super Bowl by visiting the NBCSports.com website. As with the app, streaming content from the NBC website will include the game itself, plus all of the add-ons.
Mac users can use AirPlay with an Apple TV to stream content to their television sets.
iPhone
NBC does not have the rights to stream Super Bowl content to iPhone users, so the NBC Sports Live Extra app will not work for streaming the game on the iPhone. Verizon has an exclusive content deal with the NFL, which means that if you don’t have a Verizon phone, you’ll need to find an alternate way to watch the Super Bowl.
If you are a Verizon subscriber with a MORE Everything plan, you can stream the Super Bowl on your iPhone through the Verizon NFL Mobile app.
NFL Mobile can be downloaded from the App Store for free. [Direct Link]
International
If you’re not in the United States but want to watch Super Bowl XLIX, you can purchase an NFL Game Pass that gives access to a live stream of the Super Bowl for $9.99. NFL Game Pass lets you stream NFL games on your computer or iPad.
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