Tag: Apple

Posted in Apple, Rants

The prices are ‘great’ for black friday

Posted on by RustyG

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

As many people will know, I am not a big Apple person. I have been a PC guy since before I can remember. I have admittedly owned an iPhone for the last 5 years and had an iPod since the 4th generation iPod Photo. I have recently changed over to the Android side of things for my main phone and loving it! Now, with all of that out of the way, I want to get to my main point, about my distaste for Apple and their pricing. I will say this on the front end. Apple makes GREAT products, don’t get me wrong there. My problem is, the pricing that they apply to their products, claiming their superiority over all things, based upon their design and quality. I get that, in a sense, but after seeing the latest black Friday promotion from Apple (and many other pricing issues) and seeing their “discounts”, it just disgusts me. They think they are doing the Apple FanBoys a favor by giving them such a small discount on their products, and they are STILL making, I am assuming, a sizable profit off of the product.

So let me show you what I am talking about. Black Friday is suppose to be about deep discounts on items that are either meant to get you in the door or to buy multiples of one item. And when I say deep discounts, I am talking about a 50″ LCD HDTV that is going for $298. I am talking a 32GB SD Card for $15.99. I am talking an iPad 2 for $399 with a $75 gift card. Now the latter is what I was really getting at. Apple is holding their own black Friday “event” as well. Just not as much of a discount. So lets compare the Walmart deal and the Apple deal. You can get an almost 2 year old product for the GREAT LOW price of $399 direct from Apple today, right now with no discounts or anything like that. They just released the 4th generation iPad back a few weeks ago if you didn’t know. So worldwide retailer Walmart has added in a nice $75 gift card with their iPad deal. What has Apple done? $31 off. Let me repeat that. $31 off. Walmart is beating you by $44. Now don’t get me wrong, that isn’t $44 cash, it is a $75 gift card for you to spend more at their store, because the idea is, that you will buy more than $75 worth, and see the gift card as a discount. It’s a psychological thing that they hope that you do after you get the card. Even all of that aside, it seems the place to get your iPad 2 is Walmart. Apple? Why not offer more off and do it as a gift card, or just take more off of your 2 year old tablet, without Retina display, I may add.

There are many more instances I can speak of, but this was the only one that really sparked my interest. Apple thinks so highly of itself, that basically, they don’t allow their retailers to go much cheaper, or give much of a discount in their own store. I just don’ think they should call their sales, a black Friday event. More like a , “hey, we know you want our stuff, and everyone else is doing better discounts, but c’mon, you know you want us” event.

 

Just a thought that I had today on this day of giving thanks.

-Rusty G

Posted in Apple

iPad 3 rumors and updates (pre Official Announcement)

Posted on by RustyG

So with the iPad 3 looming, a lot of people are wondering and speculating what is going to happen this Tuesday, March the 7th. Apple has always been a company of secrecy since the beginning, all starting with Steve Jobs. It seems though, as the years have gone on, and Apple incorporates more and more manufacturers in the process of building their products, it makes it even harder to keep things under wraps. We are now under 3 days away from finally getting the official announcement from Apple, and it seems we already know all about this tablet. Many of the rumors are still in speculation, but four of them seem to be up in the air. There are apparently going to be 3 flavors of this new iPad 3 (as well as a new Apple TV, not the iTV). We currently only know of two for the two carriers, wifi only and the wifi +3G versions. The third one is where the rumors start to really separate themselves out, and we won’t know the truth until March 7th.

Rumor #1

iPad 3 has a third version and it is going to be a 4G iPad, both for Verizon and At&t. (Wall Street Journal reporting)

Not only 4G, but Quad-Core as well (CNBC reporting, but there seems to be differing processor as well, the A5X and then the A6.

 

Rumor #2

iPad 3 has a third version and it is going to be not an iPad 3. It is going to be an 8GB iPad 2 for the lower end market. Possibly to fill the iPad orders that all of these schools are going to order for their new text books.

 

Rumor #3

iPad 3 has a third version and it is going to be a smaller iPad, somewhere between 7″ and 8″ to compete with the Amazon Kindles or any other small sized tablets on the market. This also can get them down in price as well.

 

Rumor #4

iPad 3 has a third version and it is not going to be an iPad 3. It is going to be an iPad 2S. Along side the iPad HD (3).

 

Any takers on what it will be? My guess, is going to be the new iPad 2 with 8GB that is cheaper and more deploy able in the schools and business districts. Also helping keep the cost down for those schools or businesses that want to mass deploy these things, they really don’t need a 64GB (or 128GB) iPad, especially if they are using iCloud to backup their data. I can even backup my guess because the US Airforce has just put an order for 18,000 iPad 2’s. No one ever said what size they were. Running at $9.4 million dollars for the 1 year contract, let’s see here: $9.4 million/18,000 iPad 2’s=$522.22 per unit. But according to the report, they got a discount. So you could speculate this to be the $599 iPad 2 32GB. Now that I think about it though, the math doesn’t really help the case that it would be an 8GB iPad 2. We’ll skip the math part. Just act like you never read that. I’m just saying that who puts a year contract out there, on a product that is already about to be phased out, and by times end, it will be time for iPad 4!

Either way, I am sticking with my guns on that one. Let’s just hope that Apple doesn’t jack up the price though, since these screens apparently are going to be more expensive. It could be though, that iPad 2 sticks around much like the iPhone 3GS is still loitering around for $0.99 with AT&T. Apple may want to keep its iPad 2 as a backup, that they can sell at a cheaper price and still make huge amounts of money. Heck they were doing it with the MacBooks for a little while. They were able to market having a portable laptop for $999, but since then, the Macbook Air has taken that spot. The MacBook Air rumors are even more fun!

Now with all of that out of the way, it seems no matter what the rumors are, we do have the parts floating around out there, but they can’t all seem to match up in the same hands. The iFixit team, seems to have gotten their hands on the new 2048×1536 screen from the “iPad 3” (as she will do many times in that video). You can see the reports here or here. If you don’t like reading very much, you can just see the video here below:

There is another “leaked” team from MIC Gadget that says that they have the casing and the front bezel and glass. They will even show you the full video here below as well. Just watch, it looks like the Smart Covers will still work, which is good for those of you that have invested into those. It is quite possible that these may NOT fit into the iPad 2 cases though, because they look to be thicker and more tapered. Again, if you don’t want to read the report, feel free to watch the video here:

it does seem however though, that iPad is already out there running iOS 6, but it is doubtful that we will see it in the iPad 3, maybe just a glimpse of it, like Apple has always done before. My bet is the iPad 3 will be loaded with iOS 5.1 with only minor changes to possibly include some of the new features that will allow it to do SIRI (along side the iPhone 4S), chat with iMessage users on OSX Mountain Lion or something to incorporate the new display all together. While we are waiting though on iPad 3 to be announced, it seems the people who brought us the iPhone 5 Concept video, has now brought us the iPad of the future design concept video as well:

If you have any desire to stay up-to-date like this on all of the rumors, feel free to check out Mac Rumors, Apple Insider or just follow my blog!

but no worries… This coming October will be a lot more fun when we get to finally see the iPhone 5!

Cheers!!!

Posted in CES 2012, Technology

CES Rumors and HP Secrets

Posted on by RustyG

Well, it seems that while Apple seems to be be taking over the news (again) with the rumored AppleTV that we all knew about since the release of the Walter Isaccson biography of Steve Jobs, HP seems to have a possible ace of its sleeve with a newly “leaked” trailer type video for a new ultrabook. Apple right now, is the leader in this market with the MacBook Air. There are others out there by Acer and Lenovo, but those two companies are much smaller than HP or Apple, so I don’t think they have the market cornered just yet. It seems though as Apple is already building some steam for the month of January, it may be one of the companies of 2012 to keep an eye on. The rumor mill is also stirring with news of the iPad 3, a January media event and hackers running iPhone and iPad apps fullscreen on the AppleTV.

HP will have to step up its game in these “leaks” if they want anymore excitement in this news. I think as the weeks pass and we all begin to overlook some of HP’s blunders, we may see more information leading up to CES 2012. I think that the HP WebOS is a possible sell off or it may even be brought back by HP with the sale of the HP touchpad over and over and over again this last year. Even with all that craziness that was 2011 for HP, I don’t think a new CEO will solve all of their problems either. I mean, her last job was eBay, not really a hardware company at all. Does she have the intellect and determination to make HP a great company again? Only time will tell.

I can say though, HP is everywhere when it comes to laptops though. Bestbuy and Amazon has to be two of the biggest retailers that sell their laptops like it is going out of style. Everywhere I go these days, all I see is that little HP logo or the Apple logo. I really don’t see Dell, Toshiba, Acer or really any other manufacturer that much out there. As for myself, my last two personal laptops have been HP. So will this newly “leaked” HP ultrabook be the revival of the HP name? Or will the logo change be all that they need? With all of this going on, and 2012 just now getting started, I hope the best for HP, and can’t wait to the see the Spectre at CES!!

Posted in Apple, Technology

Siri Has an Attitude (and knows the answer to ultimate question of life)

Posted on by RustyG

Well it seems as the iPhone 4S starts to trickle down to the rest of us over the next 24 hours, (or later) there are others who are already having some hands on time with the SIRI beta inside the iPhone 4s. I saw an article yesterday in which Jason Snell of MacWorld.com got to play with the SIRI beta in about an 11 minute video. If you go to about 5:18 in the video, you will see a funny reference to the Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy book/movie.

Continue to watch, because just after that, it seems the SIRI programmers have added some quick wit to the digital assist as well. It’s a pretty funny little bit to watch. It’s pretty cool to watch exactly what SIRI can do on the iPhone 4S, and because it is still in Beta, there is a lot to be done. I do think, on a side note, that SIRI will come to the iPhone 4, eventually. Either way, as more and more people get their hands on the iPhone 4S, they are all trying out the new digital assistant to see what all it can do. There is even a few videos out there showing us what happens if you tell SIRI “I love you“. So as the days come and some of you start messing with it, let me know what you come up with. In the mean time, I think that this is the best one yet, and it happened just before iFixit started to do the teardown of the phone.

iFixit: “Siri, may we disassemble you for all to see?”

iPhone 4S (Siri): “42”

iFixit: “I didn’t ask for the meaning of life, Siri…”

iPhone 4S (Siri): “42 is the number of seconds you have left until I initiate the self-destruct sequence…”

iFixit: “Message received.”

-Rusty G

Posted in Apple, Rants, Technology

Stop Cluttering my Screen with CRAP Apple!

Posted on by RustyG

Maybe I am the only one seeing this, as the iOS gets updated EVERY year, but I am seriously getting ticked at the amount of icons that I have to have on the home screen. Remember iOS 1? Those were the simple times. Look at this, my iPhone from stock now has to have 2 home screens to fit everything on it!


What?!?! If you saw my post earlier, you saw I already don’t like the idea of Music and Video being separated into two different apps. They are doing the same function. Playing media, you know what else USED to do that? the iPod app. I don’t want my iPhone looking like an iPod Touch. It looks tacky. The bad part is, even apple groups together the crap you don’t use, under utilities. Voice Memos, which seemed to have turned blue? Did I miss that? Contacts? Why did we ever pull that out of the phone app? That is duplicating what you already have. I guess there was such an outcry to have a one click access to it? Who really uses the compass? The only utility I use is the calculator. I don’t use Weather or Stocks and I hardly use the notes app. Oh wait, we added a ‘new’ app. Reminders. I guess this adds a checklist or some other feature to reminders that are already in the calendar. I just won’t really ever use it. Also, why can’t the iTunes and App store be one icon? When I click on the iTunes store on the PC or Mac, it’s one place, why not on the phone too? I don’t need all this crap filling up my screen before I even get started. I LOVED the folders when they finally implemented it in iOS 4, and I think it was a GREAT design choice. Less clutter is better! Oh, Newsstand and Gamecenter, I don’t like you much either. I use the feature of gamecenter RARELY to find people to play with, but I never actually click on the icon. I don’t think I will ever use Newsstand either. The phone just has too small of a screen to read anything on. ALTHOUGH, the new reader feature in Safari is great! (Another GREAT design choice!) Why can’t I pick a custom install where I get to choose what shows up? Just like iBooks, I don’t have to install it, but if I want to, it is a free download away. Please work on this in the future. Maybe iOS 5.1? Here’s to dreaming.