Month: May 2021

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  Apple Music on an iPhone with these new audio features enabled. [credit: Apple ]

Today, Apple announced that its Apple Music streaming app will get two major new audio features next month: lossless audio support and spatial audio with Dolby Atmos for a wide range of supported headphones and speakers.

Apple Music will play songs in Dolby Atmos automatically when users play the music over the built-in speakers in "the latest versions" of the iPhone, iPad, and Mac, as well as through a connected Apple TV 4K or AV receiver. Songs will also automatically use Atmos when played on AirPods or Beats headphones that have Apple's H1 or W1 chips. Users will be able to manually enable Atmos on other headphones by tweaking the app's settings.

Spatial audio will be limited to certain songs, but Apple says "thousands of songs" across numerous genres "including hip-hop, country, Latin, pop, and classical" will support it at launch, with more to come.

Enlarge / Rocket Lab's Electron vehicle stands on the pad in New Zealand prior to Saturday's launch. (credit: Rocket Lab)

Rocket Lab said Monday that it is continuing to review data from the flight of its 20th Electron launch, which failed to reach orbit after lifting off on Saturday, May 15.

In a news release on its website, the US-based company said the rocket experienced an anomaly "almost three minutes" into the launch of two BlackSky Global satellites, after the rocket's first and second stages had separated.

"Preliminary data reviews suggest an engine computer detected an issue shortly after stage two engine ignition, causing the computer to command a safe shutdown as it is designed to do," the company said. "The behavior had not been observed previously during Rocket Lab's extensive ground testing operations, which include multiple engine hot fires and full mission duration stage tests prior to flight."

Enlarge / Rochelle Walensky, director of the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), adjusts her protective mask during a Senate Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions Committee hearing in Washington, DC. (credit: Getty | Bloomberg)

Criticism and confusion have erupted following the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s abrupt recommendation last Thursday that fully vaccinated people can immediately shed masks in most settings. The agency is yet again on the defense over its mask guidance.

Mask usage has been one of the most contentious issues throughout the pandemic—and that seems unlikely to change anytime soon. Just last Tuesday, CDC Director Rochelle Walensky faced a grilling from Senate Republicans, who suggested that the agency was being too slow and too conservative in its health guidance, particularly on the issue of outdoor mask use.

At the time, the agency recommended that fully vaccinated people should continue to wear masks in many uncrowded indoor settings as well as in crowded outdoor settings. “We will continue to recommend this until widespread vaccination is achieved,” Walensky said in an April 27 briefing. On that day, around 29 percent of the US population was fully vaccinated.

Enlarge (credit: Getty Images | Bloomberg)

AT&T today announced it will spin off WarnerMedia—including HBO and Warner Bros.—into a new company, less than three years after AT&T bought Time Warner Inc. for $108 billion.

AT&T said it struck a deal with Discovery, Inc. to combine WarnerMedia and Discovery's assets into a "standalone global entertainment company." AT&T would receive $43 billion in the all-stock transaction through "a combination of cash, debt securities, and WarnerMedia's retention of certain debt." AT&T shareholders would receive stock in 71 percent of the new media company, while Discovery shareholders would own the other 29 percent.

AT&T expects it to take a full year to complete the spinoff and combination with Discovery. "The transaction is anticipated to close in mid-2022, subject to approval by Discovery shareholders and customary closing conditions, including receipt of regulatory approvals," AT&T said.

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  On the back, you get a single giant camera, a time-of-flight sensor, and an LED flash. That's it. [credit: Sharp ]

Is filling the back of a smartphone with several small camera lenses really the best camera solution? Sharp is bucking the multi-camera trend with the Aquos R6, a phone with—get this—a single massive camera on the back. Sharp is skipping all the wide-angle zoom lenses out there and going with a giant 1-inch camera sensor instead. This is either the single biggest smartphone camera sensor ever or it's tied for the largest ever, depending on how you categorize 2014's Panasonic Lumix CM1, which isn't so much a "phone" as it is a point-and-shoot camera that runs Android and can make phone calls.

Sharp is not talking about its camera sensor supplier, but there's a good chance the part is from fellow Japanese company Sony, which has had a 1-inch "IMX800" sensor circulating around the rumor mill for some time. Sony is the leading smartphone camera sensor manufacturer, so don't be surprised to see a few more 1-inch sensor phones this year. The rest of the specs look pretty good, too. The phone comes with Android 11, a Snapdragon 888 SoC, 12GB of RAM, 128GB of storage, a 5000 mAh battery, a microSD slot, a headphone jack, and a USB-C port.

The display is a Sharp-made OLED with a whopping 240 Hz refresh rate. Sharp has made 240 Hz displays before, but it says this one is the "world's first" display to have a dynamic refresh rate that goes from 1 Hz to 240 Hz, depending on the content.