Apple wins design patents for slide-to-unlock, original iPhone

U.S. Patent and Trademark Office grants design patents for the contentious user interface asset.

Apple was granted design patents today for the contentious slide-to-unlock user interface asset and the design for the original iPhone.

The U.S. Patent and Trademark Office approved Apple application No. D675,639 for "ornamental design for a display screen or portion thereof with a graphical user interface," which includes illustrations of the familiar horizontal bars with rounded corners found at the bottom of locked iOS screens since the original iPhone's debut in 2007.

Slide-to-unlock functionality has become a major sticking point with handset makers. Apple, which was granted a patent for the feature in 2011, has charged both Motorola and Samsung with violating patents related to the functionality.

Latest jailbreak for iOS arrives, works with iPhone 5

A new software tool promises deep system access to the inner workings of the iPhone 5, as well as Apple's latest devices, running the newest iOS.

Despite Apple's best efforts to keep users from gaining deep access to its iOS software, it's proven to be a cat-and-mouse game that just won't quit.

The latest -- from the mouse front -- is a tool calledevasi0n, which was released this morning. The software jailbreaks the most recent version of Apple'siOS 6 software, something that's already been accomplished. However this new, much-awaited tool continues to work even if you restart your iPhone oriPad, and also works with the iPhone 5.

The software itself runs on Mac, Windows, and Linux and can be used on "all iPhone, iPod touch, iPad and iPad mini models running iOS 6.0 through 6.1," its creators say. Once installed, users can install applications on their phone outside of Apple's App Store using tools like Cydia. Some of those same software tweaks can also be used to make major changes, like reskinning the operating system, or adding extra functionality.

The effort comes just a few days after Redsn0w, a similar jailbreak solution that worked on iOS 6.1, but was not compatible with Apple's newer chip architecture found on the iPhone 5, as well as the latest iPads and iPod Touch. 

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Apple is done, say teens

Future adults allegedly believe, according to research, that Apple isn't cool any more. They're more impressed by Samsung's Galaxy and Microsoft's Surface.

When you want to know what's cool, you ask a teenager.

You have to ask her nicely or she will scowl you into oblivion or patronize you into a painful purgatory.

So I'd like to prepare you for some of this difficulty.

Teens have decided that Apple is, like, so over. If you want to be a veritable cooleratus, you want to be seen with a Samsung Galaxy phone in your hand or a Microsoft Surface laptoppy tabletstuck under your arm.

This definitive information comes to me courtesy of research performed by Buzz Marketing, as well as three 14-year-olds who tried to rob me of my orange Puma sneakers.

When they saw I had an iPhone, they couldn't even be bothered to take the sneakers. (I exaggerate slightly about this last element.)

Suppliers hint at changes to MacBook Air -- Digitimes

While it's a given that the MacBook Air is coming up for a redesign, it's a question of degree. The industrial design won't change much, according to a report from the Taiwanese site.

One of the first MacBook Air rumors of the season alludes to internal changes but few external tweaks.

A fresh report from the not-always-reliable Taipei-based Digitimes claims the "industrial design will not see any major changes" in 2013.

Apple introduced the accentuated wedge aesthetic in late 2010 (see photo above), so about a year and a half will have transpired if new MBAs are introduced in the first half of 2013.

The report makes no mention of displays, but that's an area of intense focus for Apple. The high end of the MacBook Pro line now sports Retina displays with edge-to-edge glass versus the wide metal bezel on the non-Retina Airs.

Apple drops patent claim against Samsung Galaxy S3 Mini

iPhone maker withdraws infringement allegations in exchange for assurances that Samsung will not market the smartphone in the U.S.

Apple has agreed to withdraw patent infringement allegations against Samsung's new Galaxy S3 Mini in exchange for assurances that the South Korean electronics giant will not market the smartphone in the U.S.

Apple disclosed the agreement today in a filing with the U.S. District Court for Northern California. The iPhone maker requested last month that the new smartphone and other Samsung products be added to the ongoing patent dispute between the two companies. Samsung countered that the S3 Mini was unavailable for purchase in the United States, however Apple noted that the new smartphone was listed on Amazon's U.S. storefront and had been purchased and delivered to multiple U.S. addresses.

"Apple will agree to withdraw without prejudice its request to include the Galaxy S III Mini in this case given Samsung's representation that it is not making, using, selling, offering to sell, or importing that product into the United States," Apple said in its filing. Apple had previously argued that the device infringed on the same patents included in its $1.5 billion verdict against Samsung. However, Apple has been unsuccessful in securing sales bans.The unlocked phone quietly appeared on Amazon last month, running Android 4.1 Jelly Bean and featuring a 4-inch Super AMOLED display, a dual-core 1-gigahertz processor, 1 gigabyte of RAM, and 8GB of internal storage. While the new phone supports either T-Mobile USA or AT&T, it lacks support for any 4G LTE connectivity.

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Fresh iPad rumor: Thinner, lighter version due in March

Apple is prepping a thinner, lighter fifth-generation iPad that shares some of its design cues with the recently released iPad Mini, according to Japanese blog Macotakara. The report was picked up and translated by 9to5Mac.

The report also calls for the next iPad Mini to be released with a Retina display, following other similar reports. The addition wouldn't be surprising, as it was a key missing feature with the original iPad Mini.

The release of a next-generation iPad would drastically shorten an already shortened product life cycle for Apple's main tablet. Thefourth-generation iPad was released last month, just eight months after the third-generation iPad, and the proposed next version would come just five months later. The March timing has been the company's usual launch period for the iPad.

Macotakara cited unnamed sources for its report, and it's unclear whether Apple would want to release an iPad so soon after the last one.

But looking back, the fourth-generation iPad could have been the anomaly, a version released to ensure all of Apple's products had the same Lightning dock connector.

CNET contacted Apple for comment, and we'll update the story when we get a response.

Macotakara calls for the next iPad to have dimensions of 4mm in height, 17mm in width, and 2mm in depth, which is a near physical impossibility. The more likely scenario is that those dimensions represent the difference. The current iPad is 241.2mm in height, 185.7mm in width, and 9.4mm in depth.

Presumably, the next iPad would pick up the white and silver and black and slate elements from the iPad Mini, which in turn picked them up from the iPhone 5.

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Will Samsung top Apple by withholding revolutionary tech?

Samsung is drawing closer and closer to the technology that will transform the future of smartphones and tablets. The company will show off its progress in a couple of weeks at CES2013 when it demos a 5.5-inch flexible display with a 1,280x720-pixel resolution and a 267-pixel density (an upgrade to the one pictured above from CES 2011).

While these displays are still at least a couple of years away from being used in mainstream products, they represent the next big innovation in mobile devices. They will enable much thinner, more power-efficient smartphones and tablets, and a lot more flexibility (pun intended) in product designs and form factors.

The big question is whether Samsung will share this innovation with Apple.

As you know, Apple and Samsung are still embroiled in an epic legal battle over whether Samsung has illegally mimicked Apple devices and infringed on Apple patents with its Galaxy family of smartphones and tablets.

Since Samsung is also the maker of lots of mobile-hardware components, Apple had been one of its best customers. And from Apple's point of view, Samsung was one of its most important partners for the iPhone, iPad, and iPod lines.

However, the legal cold war between the two companies has inevitably altered the relationship. Apple has been methodically moving business away from Samsung. While some of this has been guised in the wisdom of diversifying its supply chain, it's impossible not to suspect this as retribution for Samsung's perceived improprieties.

Apple loses bid for permanent ban on Samsung phones in U.S.

A U.S. District Court judge denied Apple's bid to ban a number of Samsung's devices from sale in the U.S., a little more than a week after a hearing on the matter.

In a late ruling Monday, Judge Lucy Koh -- who presided over the entire trial between the two tech giants -- denied Apple's bid for a sales ban on 26 Samsung products, saying that any infringing features were just part of a larger feature set, thus making a sales ban too broad.

"The phones at issue in this case contain a broad range of features, only a small fraction of which are covered by Apple's patents," Koh wrote. "Though Apple does have some interest in retaining certain features as exclusive to Apple, it does not follow that entire products must be forever banned from the market because they incorporate, among their myriad features, a few narrow protected functions."

Apple declined to comment on the ruling, and Samsung did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Three reasons a Windows 8 laptop leads, MacBook lags

This week Hewlett-Packard offered a few good reasons to consider a Windows 8 laptop over a MacBook.

Those arguments are embodied in an upcoming 3-pound HP EliteBook Revolve business ultrabook "convertible" that was announced this week.

The MacBook Air is a fine design (I use one every day) and the new 13-inch Retina MacBook Pro is an even better design. But the Apple way isn't the only way. Here are three features that the MacBook ain't got.

Built-in 4G: The EliteBook Revolve offers built-in 4G LTE or HSPA+. Wi-Fi-only MacBooks are getting a bit stodgy. It's almost 2013. 4G should at least be optional on a MacBook.

Let's put it this way, if 4G is an option for the iPad, why not for a tiny 2.4-pound MacBook Air? And if HP is including it in an ultrabook like the Revolve, you can bet there's a reason: some of HP's business customers are demanding it.

And sharing plans make it feasible to share 4G data across multiple devices now.

Touch screen: I've said this before and I'll say it again. Touch is de rigueur for any mobile device now. And two years from now, a portable device without a touch screen will be an anachronism. Like a keyboard without a mouse.

Fact is, HP offered a touch-screen tablet long before the iPad. Unfortunately, it was saddled with Windows XP. And HP (and Microsoft) could never see beyond the stylus as an input medium.

Docking station: I used HP docking stations for years (which the Revolve includes). They were a godsend. When you need to pick up and run, it's just a matter of popping the lappy out. No disconnecting and reconnecting cables.

Yeah, there are plenty of third-party docking stations out there, but nothing beats a dock spec'd by the PC maker.And good docking stations (like those from HP) offer every port under the sun. So by plugging into the dock, you get the range of ports typically found only on desktops.

Why? Because the dock's design starts on the laptop: high-speed, well-placed docking connectors must be conceived first on the laptop, then the dock design follows.

Like I said, I like my MacBook -- a lot. But its limitations can feel claustrophobic on days. Especially when compared with some of the emerging Windows 8 competition.

But that's what competition is about. Apple is only one company. The Windows 8 crowd comprises scores of companies with plenty of good ideas of their own.

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How To Install MacOS On Windows Vista

If you still think that you need macintosh computer to try MacOS, that's already in the past. Now you can try MacOS on Windows Vista. How to do it ? Check this out !

First thing that you need to do is you need to have VM Player that can be download from VM Player Free and of course DVD installer MacOS X version 10.4.5 or 10.4.6 or 10.4.7 or 10.4.8.

1. Run VM Player, Start -> All Programs -> VM Ware -> VM Player.
2. Create new virtual machine, by click New Virtual Machine.
3. Then click next
4. Then choose Custom, and click next then next again.
5. Then choose Other and FreeBSD for the version. For Core 2 Duo and Core Duo user
with 945 pm (Calistoga) you need to choose Windows NT. This step is needed to
prevent the processor to failed in boot DVD MacOS. Then click next.
6. Give your new virtual machine with MacOS for easier identification.
7. Then answer one, if there is a question that asked you about how many virtual
processor that will be created. (Still answer one although there are 2 processor
on your computer)
8. Then you need to set how many memory that you will allocated for MacOs, you suggest
to set it to 256 mb ( 512 mb from 1.5 gb is very recommended). Then next.
9. Then choose [Use bridged networking] and next then next again.
10. Then choose create new virtual disk and next.
11. Then you need to set what kind of your virtual disk, IDe or SCSI. Then next.
12. After that you need to set the capacity of your new virtual disk.
13. After you click next, you need to decide where your virtual disk will placed.
Choose place that different with place where your main operation system place,
14. Then click finish, and close VM window.
15. Now you need to open windows explorer, and find VM ware setting. The default
location is on Documents\Virtual Machines\MacOS X. Then open configuration file
( with .vmx) using notepad.
16. Add paevm=”true” on the last row. If with this configuration failde to boot
virtual machine, you can change scsi0.present = “TRUE” with scsi0.present =
“FALSE”.
17. Save the configuration .vmx file.
18. Now insert DVD MaacOS and Power On This Virtual Machine.
19. When booting MacOS take process, press F8 and type -v. This will bring you to
verbose mode, that will make easier to detect if there is something wrong with
the installation.
20. After GUI (graphical user interface) screen appear, follow step by step until you
need to choose hard disk. Click Utilities, then Disk Utility.
21. Choose VM drive on the left panel, and partition on the right panel.
22. Change partition volume to 1 and give it a name. Make sure that format will be
created is Mac OS Extended (Journaled) and make sure that the space is sufficient.
23. Click partition and click partition ones again. After your disk formating is
finish, you can close Disk Utility window and your partition will show up on
set up page. Continue to next instalation step.
24. If you use Intel processor with SS2, make sure you choose customize and put a
check mark on patch.
25. After you only need to click continue and wait until instalation process finish.
And you can enjoy Apple operation system on Vista.

Happy trying !!

MacBook Air: How Incomplete Is It?

Steve Jobs is, among many other things, the great denier. Second mouse buttons, floppy drives, 56-kbps modems--for decades, he has been perfectly willing to release products lacking one or more features that are standard equipment on everyone else's computers, if he thinks they're unnecessary or they offend his design principles or aesthetic sense.

Typically, the news that a new Mac is missing a feature is met by yelps of protest. But then, sooner or later, the rest of the industry follows Jobs's lead. (Okay, usually--I haven't seen any one-button mouses on PCs lately.) Jobs, in other words, tends to figure out that we can live without something before the rest of the world does.

I'm not sure if he has ever denied Apple customers as many features as he will with the MacBook Air, the superthin notebook that he unveiled at this morning's Macworld Expo keynote. In introducing the Air, Jobs said that manufacturers of other thin-and-light laptops made too many compromises to make their machines sleek, like using small keyboards and screens and wimpy CPUs. But nobody else in the industry would dream of making some of the compromises that the Air makes.

So what's missing? And how big a deal is it?

An optical drive
Mildly annoying omission
This is the one thing everybody assumed the Air would leave out, although I was holding out hope that Apple would take its cue from Toshiba's optical-drive-bearing featherweight Portege 500. There's a long history of subnotebooks skipping the optical drive to shave off weight and space, so the Air's doing so won't strike anyone as shocking. And Jobs is right in that a lot of things people do with optical drives--such as watch movies and install software--can be done these days without one. (Apple's new Remote Disc feature will help in the latter instance.)

Me, I mostly use my MacBook's Superdrive for two things: ripping CDs into MP3s and making data CDs and DVDs to distribute files to friends and colleagues. I guess I could do the former on another computer and then move the MP3s to an Air--sorry, Steve, I'm not ready to buy all my music from iTunes. And cheap thumb drives can probably do the trick when I want to hand out copies of files. Still, if I were to buy an Air, I suspect I'd spring for the $99 external Superdrive.

Ethernet
Seriously annoying omission
In the old days, no notebook had built-in ethernet; you had to futz with external adapters. Then it became standard equipment. The fact that the Air lacks it makes the machine a throwback.

Jobs spoke of the Air as a machine built to be used wirelessly. But most of the hotels I stay in assume that my computer has ethernet. It's also damn handy at work. I can't imagine there are that many people who can spring for a $1799 Air who won't need ethernet at least from time to time. Apple sells an external adapter, but if I traveled with an Air, I'd probably just toss my Airport Express travel router into my briefcase, giving me a form of ethernet compatibility that doesn't actually make me plug an ethernet cable into the Air.

Multiple USB ports
Mildly annoying omission
I'm not sure when I last owned a computer with only one USB port, but it's been a very, very long time. On the other hand, it's rare that I want to plug two USB devices into my MacBook at once, and at least one of the ones I use (a SanDisk MicroMate card reader) blocks access to both of the MacBooks ports when I use it anyhow. So I wouldn't not buy an Air because of its solo USB.

Macworld 2008 Impression

The Macworld 2008 keynote is now behind us and it left a really bad taste for some of us. I think most existing iPod Touch users are a little upset with a couple of the announcements yesterday. The first announcement which I thought was good turned out to be sour. Steve Jobs said they will be adding five “new” apps to the iPod Touch, this includes: Mail, Maps, Stocks, Weather, & Notes. My initial thought was, “About time!”. Then that is when he said existing iPod Touch owners will have to pay $19.99. However, anyone buying a new iPod Touch yesterday and onward will have the five “new” apps already installed at the same price I paid a few months ago. I’m hoping Apple will see all the complaints and do the right thing by offering the five apps for free.

You can watch the keynote here

Here is what Macworld 2008 announced:

-> MacBook Air
-> iPhone Enhancements
-> iPod Touch (Five “new” Apps - Firmware 1.1.3)