Articles by Rene Ritchie
Update: Apple is now reporting all services are back up and running.
MobileMe is currently down for some via client (Mail on Mac and iPhone — count me in), and the Web (working fine for me). Maybe they were upset we gave GoogleSync all the love this morning?
Let us know how it’s working for you, and we’ll update when it’s back online for everyone.
Making good on their promise from a few days ago, O2 UK has launched a website where customers can get their iPhone’s officially unlocked starting November 10, 2009. Here are the details:
- Pay Monthly customers can get the unlock any time, but you have to keep paying O2 for the length of your remaining service contract.
- Pay Go customers can get the unlock after 12 months, for a one-time £15 fee (deducted from airtime balance).
To begin the process, customers need to complete the online form (via the link above). The process will take up to 14 days, but customers will get an SMS confirmation when it’s completed, and they can then place a non-O2 SIM in their iPhones, hook up to iTunes, and finish the unlock.
Curious as to whether the other major new iPhone multi-carrier market would be following suit, TiPb contacted Rogers and received the following reply:
Rogers policies haven’t changed in this regard.
One step forward, one step back. Hopefully Rogers will reconsider and take a page from O2’s consumer-friendly approach.
Meanwhile, if you go for the new O2 unlock, let us know how the process works out for you!
[Via Chris Oldroyd]
We’ve gotten a few reports from readers that GoogleSync, the ActiveSync connection Google’s using to push Gmail (and contacts and calendars) to iPhone users has just stopped working.
There’s a discussion going on in Google’s Support threads, including time changes, sporadic spurts, changing parameters, and other troubleshooting attempts.
If you’re having intermittent issues, or if GoogleSync is just not working for you right now, check it out and let us know what, if anything, helps fix the problem. (Other than waiting it out — GoogleSync is still in beta, of course…)
[Thanks Andrew for the tip!]
11-point multitouch tracking might sound nifty in a theoretical spec throwaway, but what does it mean to an end-user? Likely still not much, but thanks to FingerMgmt we can at least see it in action now — on a MacBook glass trackpad at least.
Apple may have debuted their modern multitouch in the iPhone, but they’ve quickly spread the technology out to their MacBook glass trackpads and now Magic Mouse for desktops. Ultimately that’s good for all of Apple’s products, as innovation in each one can benefit the others on their next revision as well. Now, 11 points might be overkill for any practical need on a display this small, but when we start dreaming of unicorns and larger form-factor iTablets… Oh the games they could make (never mind the obvious jokes about just what constitutes that 11th finger…)
C64 [$4.99 - iTunes link], the Commodore 64 emulator for iPhone and iPod touch, is back in the App Store and again available for download.
New features include:
-30% performance boost, - 3 more games (International Basketball, International Soccer, and International Tennis) - “Resolved issues and removed functionality relating to potential security risks”
Yes, that last one means that the easter egg, the one that granted access to a basic interpreter, the one that got C64 yanked from the App Store a while back, is now goners.
For those who just want great, nostalgic C64 games, however, the action is all still there…
NAVIGON dropped us a note to say that, as promised, their latest update to MobileNavigator [$89.99 for North America - iTunes link] for iPhone is now available via the iTunes App Store, and it includes Traffic Live as an in-app purchase (currently on sale at an introductory $19.99, $24.99 thereafter). Here’s how it works:
Traffic Live utilizes crowdsourced real-time speed data from over 1.3 million drivers including other NAVIGON app users (who opt. in to participate), commercial fleets such as trucks and taxis, as well as regular drivers with a GPS system. So if for example several vehicles on a road report slow speed, the system recognizes congestion and provides an alternate and faster route.
If you add the Traffic Live service, let us know how it works for you.
Hot on the heels of Verizon pretty much burying the Storm2 in favor of their latest lust, the Droid, BlackBerry maker Research in Motion used their annual developer conference to announce a few improvements for the platform. No, not word one about a next generation BlackBerry OS (hey, Palm spent their time in the desert to get to webOS, and Microsoft is still trudging towards Windows Mobile 7, so RIM needs to pick up that canteen and get to stepping!).
Still, Kevin and the CrackBerry crew have been tearing up the coverage, so check out their DevCon 2009 liveblog, and here are a couple more handy links to help you keep track of all the pushy news:
- Open GL ES Support, Java GUI Builder and Theme Studio to Help BB Developers Generate Dynamic User Experiences
- BlackBerry Application Platform Enhancements to Foster Rich Content Development
- RIM Unveils New Services Platform for BlackBerry Developers
- RIM and Adobe to Simplify Delivery Of Rich Content and Applications for BlackBerry Smartphones
- RIM Announces BlackBerry Academic Program
So, what do you think, in the face of iPhone 3.x, Android 2.0, and webOS 1.x, is RIM doing enough to keep the BlackBerry competitive?
Apple has just released their second minor update to their latest desktop operating system, Mac OS X Snow Leopard 10.6.2. While there are a lot of fixes for Mac users, iPhone users may want to pay particular attention to the “general reliability improvements” for MobileMe and iDisk. (And yes, the infamous “guest account” data deletion bug looks to have been squashed.
If you’re a Mac user and go for the immediate update, let us know how it works for you.
[Thanks to everyone who sent this in!]
With the UK moving from the iPhone exclusively on O2, to one launching on Orange UK tomorrow, with Vadafone UK/Ireland and perhaps 3 also in line, what does this mean for existing iPhone users and their carrier-locked iPhones? Thankfully, it looks like O2 is doing to do right by you:
Once the iPhone becomes available on other UK networks, we will allow O2 customers to unlock their iPhones, although of course they will still need to honour any outstanding contract period they have. At the end of their contract period, they are entirely free to move to another operator — though naturally we hope they won’t want to!
Excellent news for the UK, and we can only hope other countries and carriers, like Rogers, Bell, and Telus in Canada, will swiftly follow suit (we won’t hold our breath though…)
We’re not sure how this process would be handled, for example, would an iPhone user need to physically go to an O2 service rep to have their iPhone unlocked via in-store iTunes tools? If anyone has an answer, let us know.
[Times Online via Stuartino in the TiPb forums]
iPhone owners, what’s your new #2? We’ve asked this before, but with devices like the Android DROID, BlackBerry Storm2, Nokia N900, Palm Pre, and Windows Mobile HD2 really ramping things up of late, we figured it was a great time to check in again.
Which new device has you most interested? Which is the most tempting? If there was no iPhone, which one would you get? Vote above, and let us know why in the comments!
