Displaying items by tag: iPad

You know there is nothing better than seeing a company mythology fall apart, especially if that mythology is one that has perpetuated a lie and became part of a much larger campaign intended to mislead consumers. Yes we are talking about Apple here, but you probably already knew that. The part of the mythology in question here is the falsehood that Apple has to invent everything and then the rest of the tech world copies them.

The tablet and smartphone market is exploding there is no doubt about that. Although Apple was the first to market with a widely accepted consumer product in the iPad they were not the first and are certainly not going to the be last with a device. The same goes for the smart phone where other companies had the idea of a smart phone long before Apple brought the iPhone out on stage. Still we will not argue that Apple did help pave the way for the boom that is coming.

Every now and then in the midst of products that are intended to make your system more powerful or impress your friends we get to play with products that are fun. We found this in a pair of external speakers from a company called Accessory Power. The speakers are designed to look like the heads of animals (in a cute way) and can work with PCs, phones, tablets and pretty much anything with a 1/8-inch speaker jack. In addition to their function as a speaker set they are also intended to bring awareness to endangered species. We were lucky enough to receive two different models for our testing and enjoyment. So let’s take you along as we see if the Accessory Power Gogroove Speaker Pals Panda and Koala sets are worth your time and money.

We have had a couple of products from the House of Marley in the lab and in the whole have found them to be excellent offerings for the price that they go for. The Reggae themed headsets combine renewable materials with exceptional tuning and a great sound. So far we have taken a look at the Zion in ear and the Redemption Song on-ear headsets. Today we have another one of the On-ear style headsets in the lab. This time it is the Stir it Up (Harvest). These have the same price point as the Redemption Song $199.99 so let’s see if they have the same quality in terms of build and sound.

In our continuing coverage of life after Steve Jobs at Apple (and our preparation for that new website Sh*t Tim Cook Says) we are bringing in a few new links and other fun items today. It seems that a typical Apple earnings call brings more pleasure to the press than almost anything else. While researching this article we found so many different versions of “Apple is wonderful” articles that we lost count (and almost our lunch). The fawning over Apple was a tad on the overkill side. So let’s sum up the earnings call for you.

We warned of this happening back when we first read about the fight between Apple and the Shenzhen China base Proview. It seems that a government official in China is stating that they are backing Proview in this case. A senior official in the State Administration for Industry and Commerce (SAIC) stated that the trademark does currently belong to Proview. This comes as a shock to many especially after Tim Cook’s visit to China recently where it was thought he was trying to win support for Apple in this case.

As I made my rounds this morning (checking out what the rest of the world thinks is going on in technology) I stumbled across a couple of articles that had my laughing. One of them was just more of what I have been hearing since 1997, the PC is going away. I honestly do not know how some analyst firms can even print this any longer. The PC has been a fixture in the home and work place for so long and it is such an integrated fixture in how people do work that it is very unlikely you will see the PC go away. Still we see this almost every quarter despite both many “PC” related companies posting record quarters and PC sales actually being up between 2-4%.

Tim Cook’s recent visit to China has made more than a few headlines especially considering their position they are in right now. Not only do they have the world looking at them over issues at with Foxconn facilities, but they are also in a rather ugly legal battle with ProView over who actually owns the trademark name iPad. On the surface Cook’s visit is to discuss growth and expansion in China (which actually only means more money to Foxconn and the Chinese government). However, Cook is also more than likely there to try and squash the upstart ProView and a level higher than the Chinese court system.

The New iPad is having a VERY rough time for a new Apple product. Even the iPhone 4 with its “antennagate” issue has not gotten as much press for so many problems. The first one that was brought to our attention was the heating issue. This little problem has been vilified and explained away by multiple sites. However, there is no mistaking the fact that under usage the New iPad runs up to 13 degrees hotter than the iPad2. Apple and others have tried to say it is an increase in the number of LEDs that are used for backlighting and that is plausible, but we should also look at the fact that you have a larger battery, beefier charging system, twice the number of GPU cores (4 PowerVR SGX 543s) and also twice the amount of memory under the hood. All of this adds up in a way that the Apple engineers appear to have missed. But the heat issue is not the only problem that has been brought up this week alone.

Ever since the release of the “New” iPad we have been trying to get through the marketing hype, the incorrect bench marks and some downright incorrect conclusions on what is and is not going on with the latest tablet from Apple. After the launch of the iPad 2 we began to notice something about the way Apple was moving. When they released the iPhone and the later the iPad they appeared to be very much on top of things and also ahead of many manufacturers. However, what we saw back then (and was brought even more to light with this launch) is that Apple cannot keep up this pace. It is true that Apple has name recognition and a very broad following, but if you take a look around their marketing has slipped as has some of their reputation. Yesterday we heard about one more issue that we foresaw once we had more information on the hardware under the iPad’s hood.