Month: September 2019

• 

  The various colors of the new iPhone 11. [credit: Apple ]

CUPERTINO, Calif.—Apple on Tuesday announced the iPhone 11, the latest device in Apple's mega-popular smartphone series and the follow-up to last year's iPhone XR.

The new device comes in an anodized aluminum and glass body that Apple claims is its most durable phone design to date and comes in six new colors: purple, white, yellow, green, black, and red. It comes with a 6.1-inch version of Apple's "liquid Retina" display and improved spatial audio with Dolby Atmos support.

The iPhone 11 also features a new and updated A13 Bionic chip. Unsurprisingly, Apple says the latter will include the fastest CPU and GPU in any smartphone—we'll have to benchmark that for ourselves, but given the top-shelf power of existing A12 Bionic, it should still be more than fast enough for most people's needs.

• 

  The new Apple Watch Series 5.

CUPERTINO, Calif.—As expected, Apple executives took the stage at the company's headquarters in northern California today to announce an update to the Apple Watch. The Apple Watch Series 5 offers more customization and materials options than its predecessor, plus a few additional features.

The Series 5 looks similar to the Series 4 (it comes in the same 40mm and 44mm case sizes as well), but the biggest hardware difference is the new always-on display. The LTPO panel will now stay on indefinitely so you don't have to raise your wrist or tap the screen to see the watch face or your complications. When you're not actively looking at it, the display's brightness will dim so you can still see information on it but it won't draw more power than necessary.

That's just one of the software features Apple came up with to turn the display into an always-on panel, while also preventing it from using up too much power. The Series 5 also has a new low-power display driver, a new ambient light sensor, and additional hardware improvements that help make the display more efficient. Apple claims that the Series 5, even with its always-on display, will still get the same all-day, 18-hour battery life as the Series 4.

CUPERTINO, Calif.—In an unexpected addition to Apple's iPhone event today, the company announced a new 7th-generation iPad. In recent years, the company has saved such announcements for a separate event later in the fall, but Apple instead debuted a new version of its entry-level tablet this morning.

This new model comes with a 10.2-inch "Retina" display and an A10 Fusion chip. The latter is the same chip used for the existing 6th-gen iPad, and that chip was first introduced with the iPhone 7 and iPhone 7 Plus—so don't expect a significant performance upgrade. Still, it should provide enough power for the more basic entertainment and Web browsing needs the iPad is primarily aimed at.

Naturally, the new iPad will come with Apple's forthcoming iPadOS update, which will give the device a more robust multitasking system. It'll be able to connect to thumb drives and SD cards, too, and it will work with Apple's Pencil stylus and Smart Keyboard attachment. Apple did not mention any switch to a USB-C port as it's done with its higher-end iPad Pros, though that's not surprising with a cheaper tablet like this.

• 

  When Apple TV+ lands on November 1, it will not include all of these original series. Which ones will be ready by then? We don't know. [credit: Apple ]

CUPERTINO, Calif.—Apple's massive Tuesday product event saw CEO Tim Cook announce a release date for the Apple TV+ streaming subscription service: November 1. Starting that day, anyone who can access the Apple TV app on their devices can begin subscribing for $4.99/month.

The announcement came with a surprising amount of ambiguity in what may be most accurately described as a "soft launch" on November 1. "The first shows will be available on November 1, and we'll be adding more Apple Originals every month, in over 100 countries at launch," Cook told the Cupertino audience. The CEO also revealed that customers who purchase certain Apple hardware (Cook shouted out the iPhone, iPad, Mac, and Apple TV) will receive one year of Apple TV+ for free.

Cook did not clarify exactly which shows will count in that "first" pool, not even after introducing a world-premiere trailer for the Jason Momoa series See (think Hunger Games with a magical-realism plot about a blind race of people having children who can see). Previously, Apple has previewed several other original series, such as a newscast comedy with Jennifer Aniston and Steve Carell and the alternative Moon landing history series For All Mankind from Battlestar Galactica creator Ronald D. Moore. The last major Apple TV event included surprise cameos from Apple TV+ showrunners Oprah Winfrey and Steven Spielberg (and, of course, Big Bird).

Enlarge / Holders of large amounts of bitcoin are known as "whales." (credit: Jenny Evans/Getty Images)

Late on Thursday night, US Eastern time, someone made one of the biggest transactions in bitcoin history: 94,504 bitcoins. At the then-current bitcoin price of around $10,600, this transaction was worth almost exactly $1 billion. It's now worth around $967 million.

Bitcoin's shared transaction ledger is open, but addresses are anonymous by default. As a result, we know that the transaction occurred, but we don't know who made it or why. One analysis indicated that at least a third of the money comes from Huobi Global, a cryptocurrency exchange based in Singapore. So the transaction could reflect big withdrawals from a Huobi customer—or it could mean that Huobi itself was consolidating some of its deposits.

This isn't the largest transaction in bitcoin terms. In 2013, for example, someone moved 194,993 bitcoins in a single transaction. But bitcoins were much less valuable back then, so the transaction was only valued at around $150 million.

• 

  Frogger in Toy Town puts the classicarcade character into a new overhead platforming world.

Months after Apple Arcade was first unveiled, Apple announced today that the all-you-can-play service will launch on Sept. 19 in "over 150 countries.

The service will be price of $4.99 per month for a family subscription serving up to six people, and a one-month free trial will be available. That subscription provides access to over 100 games across iPhone, iPad, Mac, and Apple TV, Apple says, all of which feature no ads or in-app purchases and are all playable offline with a single subscription. New games will be added to the selection monthly.

At the keynote, Apple highlighted three specific games that will be available on the service. Konami's Frogger in Toy Town is an isometric platform game reminiscent of the best-selling series for the original PlayStation. Capcom's Shinsekai: Into the Depths promises what Apple calls "console-quality graphics and gameplay" in a "beautiful but treacherous underwater world." And Annapurna's Sayonara Wild Hearts was described as a "playable music video" featuring a jet bike tilting through obstacles at high speeds in time to the soundtrack.