iPhone News

Belkin launches two official Lightning accessories

Christian Zibreg ∙ Updated October 25, 2016

Unofficial Lightning accessories that use cracked chips one-up Apple's offering on price, but the "Made for iPhone" (MFi) stamp of approval has its advantages, mostly by reassuring buyers that MFi accessories meet Apple's standards of quality and extensive testing. Belkin was the first third-party manufacturer out of the gate with 30-pin connector accessories back in 2003.

On Monday, it has also become the first official Apple partner to launch Lightning-enabled accessories. The company launched a car charger and a sync dock, both priced within reach of budget shoppers. Belkin is accepting pre-orders today, promising to ship the products later this month...

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Beating its own estimate, Samsung confirms 30M Galaxy S III sales in 5 months

Christian Zibreg ∙ November 5, 2012

It's a milestone day today. First, Apple announced it sold three million new iPads over the weekend and now South Korea-based Samsung confirmed it beat its own self-imposed estimate by shipping a respectable 30 million units of the flagship Galaxy S III handset. Previously, executives for the company publicly expressed hope to move that much units by year's end. The Galaxy S III launched back in May so the figure amounts to an average of six million S III units a month...

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Apple announces sales of 3M new iPads in 3 days

Christian Zibreg ∙ Updated March 19, 2019

Apple just announced that during the opening weekend it sold three million units of both the iPad mini and the fourth-generation iPad with Retina display, exceeding the three million iPad 3 tablets sold over the course of four days back in March. It's also double the 1.5 million Wi-Fi-only iPad 3 units Apple confirmed it sold in March. Though it did not break down sales by model so we don't know how many iPad minis the company moved, Tim Cook noted Apple "practically sold out of iPad minis". Piper Jaffray analyst Gene Munster predicted sales of 1.5 million iPad minis over its opening weekend...

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Apple dodges its taxes outside the United States

Oliver Haslam ∙ Updated March 29, 2017

The subject of large companies paying their taxes is something of a hot button topic in the UK right now, which is why the likes of Starbucks have already found themselves thrown to the wolves over their accounting practices. Today, the latest multinational firm to be on the rack is Apple, with the news that it paid just 2% tax on its profits outside the US last year, leaving international taxmen considerably out of pocket.

Paperwork filed in the United States shows that Apple paid around 2% tax on its pre-tax earnings of $36.8B outside the US. That's down on the 2.5% paid the year before.

Oddly though, it's all perfectly legal...

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Siri to gain movie ticket purchasing in iOS 6.1

Cody Lee ∙ Updated October 25, 2016

Apple seeded the first beta of iOS 6.1 to developers last week. The firmware should be the next update we see for iOS, and we're expecting it to include at least a handful of new features.

In fact, we've already found a couple of new additions in the beta, including changes in the Maps app and new Lock screen music controls. And another discovery was made last night...

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Claimed unlocked iPhone 5 prices show up on Apple’s website

Cody Lee ∙ November 5, 2012

While Apple offers unlocked iPhone 5s in Canada and other countries, it has yet to give buyers inside the US that option. So unless you go through a third party vendor, you can't get an unlocked iPhone 5 here in the States.

That could be changing in the near future though. Purported prices for unlocked versions of the new handset have been discovered hidden on Apple's US website, which could mean that they're preparing to roll them out...

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The iDownloadBlog top news stories of the week [Nov 4, 2012 edition]

Sébastien Page ∙ Updated April 24, 2017

A new week is coming, but that doesn't mean you have to miss out on what happened last week. If you think you may have missed a few of the top stories from last week, don't sweat it, we've got you covered.

We've gathered the top 10+ most popular stories from iDB last week for you to check out. As always, make sure that you're friends with us on Facebook, Google+, and that you are following us on Twitter...

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Apple corrects inaccurate statement regarding Samsung patent infringement ruling on its UK website

Sébastien Page ∙ November 3, 2012

Apple just published a statement on its UK website to correct a previous apology that had been found inaccurate by the Court of Appeal of England and Wales. The statement can be found at the bottom of Apple UK website's home page, and links to a longer statement acknowledging that Samsung didn't copy the iPad.

This "updated" statement comes several days after Apple published a public apology on its website, at the request of the Court...

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Apple’s iPad mini versus Google’s Nexus 7

Jeff Benjamin ∙ Updated April 18, 2018

The closest competitor to the iPad mini is obviously Google's Nexus 7 tablet. Some may even argue that Apple felt compelled to push out the mini due to the success that Google's diminutive tablet offering has experienced.

Although it's been a while since I've dusted off my Nexus 7, there's simply no denying that it's a solid offering in many areas. I sung the device's praises, and even Sebastien, who has been a bit more critical of the device, had some nice things to say about it.

Whatever the case may be, it's pretty obvious that Apple has drawn a line in the sand with the iPad mini, and it too, is quite the compelling offering. How do the two compare? We thought you'd never ask. Check out our head-to-head comparison video inside...

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Apple tweaks the Podcasts app

Christian Zibreg ∙ November 2, 2012

Apple's (mostly) hated Podcasts app that launched in the summer last received an update in September, finally bringing iOS 6 compatibility, iCloud subscription syncing, the ability to automatically download new episodes only when on Wi-Fi and more. Earlier today, a new version surfaced on iTunes. Podcasts 1.1.2, an incremental update, includes stability and performance improvements, bug fixes and a few enhancements.

For example, tapping a podcast in Top Stations now reveals episodes you can play. Also new is the ability to turn on automatic downloads for all subscribed podcasts in Settings. Unfortunately, the dreaded 1980s animated tape-recorder interface is still there, but Jony Ive will no doubt see to it sooner rather than later...

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