Apple

Joy of Tech on the ‘disappointing’ iPhone 5

Christian Zibreg ∙ September 17, 2012

As expected, Apple's "boring" iPhone 5 has shattered previous sales record, selling two million pre-orders in just 24 hours. Cupertino's rivals were quick to point out how the updated hardware "only" boasts a slightly larger display (versus jumbo-sized Android phones), 4G LTE and a faster chip - ignoring numerous little hardware tweaks under the hood.

As Apple fans know, these include the handset's refined two-tone redesign, HD Audio for crisper phone calls, three mics, better battery life and seamless integration of hardware, software and services delivering the smoothest mobile experience there is, to name a few.

We love Joy of Tech comics and were expecting their take on the "boring iPhone 5". Here it is...

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Nokia fan (or Nokia?) creates Samsung style anti-iPhone ad

Christian Zibreg ∙ September 17, 2012

Following up on news of Samsung's upcoming anti-iPhone television commercial and sighting of an amusing print ad appearing in certain newspapers and focused on a laundry list of iPhone 5 and Galaxy SIII features, a fan of Nokia's newly introduced flagship handset, the Windows Phone 8-drive Lumia 920, has taken it upon himself  to re-work Samsung's advertisement with a little Nokia touch.

Replacing the Galaxy SIII with the Lumia 920, the new ad proclaims Nokia's device "the heawyweight champion" of smartphone wars, which have grown uglier with the iPhone 5 introduction (which shattered sales records), patent fights, Samsung's nasty ad attacks and March 2013 release of the Galaxy S4.

Now there’s a new “ad” ready to become viral, coming from Nokia fans (or maybe Windows Phone fans). The unofficial commercial is entitled “Flyweight contender, meet the heavyweight champion” and pits the Nokia Lumia 920 against the iPhone 5...

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Law student sues Apple over Siri sponsored responses

Christian Zibreg ∙ September 17, 2012

Apple's Siri digital secretary, now a feature present on the iPhone 4S/5, the new fifth-generation iPod touch and third-generation iPad, is infamous for Apple's over-the-top advertising, availability issues and inaccuracies.

Still in beta, Siri in iOS 6 is more reliable and faster. It can now display sports scores, help you make restaurant reservations, discover showtimes, watch movie trailers in-line and more. It is also tightly integrated with Apple Maps and more broadly available.

A law student is taking issue with how Siri responds to questions like "what's the best smartphone/tablet ever". As you know, based on web customer review average scores, Siri briefly used to name the Lumia 900 the best smartphone ever unitl Apple recalibrated her to favor the iPhone (with responses like "the one you're holding"), much to Nokia's disgust...

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Samsung to take on the iPhone 5 with the Galaxy S4, due in February 2013

Christian Zibreg ∙ Updated February 8, 2016

Just as Apple announced two million iPhone 5 pre-orders and admitted to demand exceeding the initial supply, the latest word on the street has it that rival Samsung is readying its answer, a successor to its Galaxy SIII flagship handset which became the most serious challenger to the iPhone based on shipments of 20 million units in its first hundred days on market (they expect to ship 30 million by year's end).

The Galaxy S4 should launch in March 2013, a month following its public introduction at the annual Mobile World Congress conference in Barcelona, Spain. Samsung officials reportedly are convinced that the device will be capable of curbing the iPhone 5, which has a bigger four-inch Retina display, twice as fast processor and fast 4G LTE and WiFi networking capabilities, plus a two-tone form factor and a host of other hardware tweaks...

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People are already in line for the iPhone 5 at New York Apple Store

Cody Lee ∙ Updated June 13, 2016

If you weren't able to place your iPhone 5 pre-order last week, and still want to pick one up on launch day, I have some good news and some bad news for you.

The good news is, Apple and other retailers will start offering the handset this Friday at 8 AM. The bad news is, it looks like some folks are already lining up...

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iPhone 5 rules competitive landscape in first Geekbench tests

Christian Zibreg ∙ September 16, 2012

Following a detailed analysis by AnandTech which exposed the A6 chip inside the iPhone 5 as bein comprised of custom ARMv7 design rather than stock Cortex-A15 cores, someone has posted an iPhone 5 benchmark on Geekbench.

Now, the handset will hit store shelves on Friday so there's no way to verify the authenticity of this poster (and Geekbench scores could be easily faked). If you believe the results though, the iPhone 5,2 hardware has a Geekbench score of 1601.

The test also shows an ARMv7 processor design with two cores clocked at 1.02GHz each, with 32KB of L1 instruction/data cache, 1MB of L2 cache and 1GB of RAM (Samsung's print ad has helped reveal that tidbit)...

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iPhone 5 found to have 1GB of RAM, custom processor

Cody Lee ∙ September 16, 2012

As usual, Apple didn't give us many details regarding the internals of the iPhone 5 outside of what it lists on the handset's Features page. We know it has an A6 processor, but that's about it.

Luckily, some smart folks have done some digging and have uncovered some interesting information about Apple's new smartphone. For instance, they've confirmed it has 1GB of RAM...

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Some iPhone 5 pre-orders to ship faster than expected

Cody Lee ∙ September 15, 2012

The iPhone 5 pre-order kickoff yesterday morning was fairly reminiscent of last year's launch. Apple's website, despite having months to prepare, quickly buckled under the influx of traffic, and more than half an hour passed before some folks could logon.

The real story though is how fast the initial pre-order stock of iPhone 5s ran out. Shipping times slipped from one to two weeks in less than an hour. Some people even saw their ship dates drop a week during the time it took them to place their order...

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Samsung’s new Galaxy S III ad takes on the iPhone 5

Cody Lee ∙ September 15, 2012

"It doesn't take a genius," according to Samsung's new ad, to see that the Samsung Galaxy S III is a better handset than Apple's new iPhone 5. "The next big thing is already here," it says.

The ad, which Samsung will start running in national and regional newspapers tomorrow, does a side-by-side comparison of the two phones, with the Galaxy S III appearing superior...

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Twitter adds iOS hacker Charlie Miller to its security team

Cody Lee ∙ September 15, 2012

If you are a long-time iDB reader, you'll likely recognize the name Charlie Miller. The iOS hacker has broken through the security of everything from the iPhone to the App Store.

Well it looks like Miller's iOS hacking days are over, at least for now. The systems expert announced on Friday that he will be joining Twitter's security team, starting next week...

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Apple “completely blown away” by customer response to the iPhone 5

Christian Zibreg ∙ September 14, 2012

Unless you've been sleeping under a rock the whole day, you probably know that iPhone 5 shipping times have dramatically been pushed back to up to 2-3 weeks, both on the online Apple store and at most carriers - just a mere hour or two after Cupertino with its partners began processing orders. Commenting on the situation, a spokesperson for the company acknowledged pent-up demand for the device, choosing interesting wording from the company's familiarly colloquial yet effective vocabulary...

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