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Founder and CEO of Theranos, Elizabeth Holmes at TEDMED 2014. (credit: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dBvzKp0AERE)

Late Thursday, federal regulators released a redacted 121-page inspection report of a Newark, California Theranos facility, which revealed that the company’s high-profile finger-prick blood tests failed quality control checks nearly 30 percent of the time.

Theranos and its CEO, Elizabeth Holmes, made waves last year with claims that they could carry out more than 200 medical tests with their Edison devices using just a few drops of blood from a finger prick—rather than a full vein draw taken by a needle. With promises that the cheap and easy finger-prick tests could revolutionize medical diagnostics, the company was valued at $9 billion.

However, since the initial buzz, the company has been hit with a series of questions, criticisms, and federal regulatory snags surrounding the accuracy and validity of its tests. In the latest setback, the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) released a redacted inspection report that seems to substantiate concerns and whistleblower reports of the Edison’s failings.

Enlarge / iFixit cracks open the iPhone SE. (credit: iFixit)

iFixit completed its customary teardown of Apple's latest iPhone yesterday, and it turns out that the similarities between the iPhone SE and the iPhone 5S don't stop at the design. Most of the repair procedures for the new phone are substantially identical to the procedures for the old phone, and in fact the two share a number of identical components: the entire display assembly—including the LCD and digitizer, front camera, earpiece speaker, and proximity sensor—is interchangeable, as are the speaker assembly, vibration motor, and SIM tray.

The shared components mean that shops already set up to repair the iPhone 5S should have no problem repairing the SE, and that you should have no problem finding compatible components from iFixit or other sources for do-it-yourself repairs. One major exception is the battery, which uses a different connector than the one in the 5S—you'll need to buy a SE-specific battery to repair the SE, and you can't give your 5S a minor battery boost by replacing its 1560mAh battery with the SE's 1624mAh version (it's only a four percent increase—you'll live).

It also highlights one of the downsides to buying an SE: the display panel is exactly the same as the one in the 5S, which means no improvements to brightness, color gamut, contrast, or any of the other small advancements Apple worked into the iPhone 6 and 6S. It's not that the 5S/SE display is bad, it just isn't as good as what you'll get in the flagships.

(credit: Valentina Palladino)

Fitbit's newest trackers have made quite an impression with customers, despite only being available for less than a month so far. The company announced that it has shipped over 1 million units of the $200 Blaze smart fitness watch and 1 million units of the $130 Alta bracelet-esque tracker since they became available in early March.

This comes as a surprise since most people, particularly Fitbit investors, were confused when the Blaze was announced at this year's CES. Although it was never meant to be an Apple Watch killer, it certainly looked similar at first glance and that raised a lot of eyebrows. Immediately after the Blaze launch, Fitbit stock dropped 18 percent.

The Alta was announced shortly after the Blaze as a more stylish alternative to the existing Fitbit Charge. In terms of features, however, the Alta and the Charge have few differences, and their prices are identical at $130. At first it was unclear where these devices fit into Fitbit's llineup, but if these sales are any indication, it appears customers are embracing the new devices.