Apple Launches iPhone 4S

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Today, Apple announced the iPhone 4S, which did not come in a new iPhone skeleton as expected but came packed with new features.  The iPhone 4S now comes with Apple’s dual-core A5 chip used in the iPad 2 which has up to 2X faster performance and 7X faster graphics. The iPhone 4S also comes with an all new 8 megapixel camera with advanced optics and full 1080p HD resolution video recording. New to the iPhone and only available in the iPhone 4S is an intelligent personal assistant called Siri, the company they bought in May last year. Siri helps you get things done just by asking using natural language. Can't wait to play with Siri! With the announcement, Apple also announced the launch of iOS 5 which has over 200 new features. In addition, Apple also announced iCloud, a complete replacement of MobileMe which has a set of free cloud services that work with your iPhone, iPad, iPod touch, Mac and PC to automatically and wirelessly store your content in iCloud and push your content to all your devices. So what do you think of the Apple's announcement yesterday?

iOS 4.3

Apple recently released its latest major update to the iPhone and iPad Operating System called iOS 4.3. The new update includes a faster mobile Safari, iTunes Home Sharing similar to the Mac where you can now share your iTunes library, AirPlay Improvements and a new Personal Hotspot which allows you to share your iPhone 4 data connection. iTunes Home Sharing is a very cool feature! So have you downloaded iOS 4.3? Let us know your experience with it. Here is the official release from Apple:

SAN FRANCISCO—March 2, 2011—Apple® today introduced iOS 4.3, the latest version of the world’s most advanced mobile operating system. New features in iOS 4.3 include faster Safari® mobile browsing performance with the Nitro JavaScript engine; iTunes® Home Sharing; enhancements to AirPlay®; the choice of using the iPad™ side switch to either lock the screen rotation or mute the audio; and the Personal Hotspot feature for sharing an iPhone® 4 cellular data connection over Wi-Fi.

“With more than 160 million iOS devices worldwide, including over 100 million iPhones, the growth of the iOS platform has been unprecedented,” said Steve Jobs, Apple’s CEO. “iOS 4.3 adds even more features to the world’s most advanced mobile operating system, across three blockbuster devices—iPad, iPhone and iPod touch—providing an ecosystem that offers customers an incredibly rich experience and developers unlimited opportunities.”

The Safari mobile browsing experience gets even better with iOS 4.3. The Nitro JavaScript engine that Apple pioneered on the desktop is now built into WebKit, the technology at the heart of Safari, and more than doubles the performance of JavaScript execution using just-in-time compilation. With the Nitro JavaScript engine, Safari provides an even better mobile browser experience working faster to support the interactivity of complex sites you visit on a daily basis.

New iTunes Home Sharing allows iOS 4.3 users to play music, movies and TV shows on an iPad, iPhone or iPod touch® from their iTunes library on a Mac® or PC over a local Wi-Fi network. With a simple tap you can enjoy all the media in your iTunes library wherever you are in your home. You can stream a movie from your Mac in one room to your iPad in another or stream an iTunes mix to your iPod touch from the office to the kitchen. With Home Sharing on your iPad, iPhone or iPod touch you’ve got your entire iTunes library in your hands wherever you are in your home.

iOS 4.3 includes enhancements to AirPlay, the breakthrough wireless technology that allows users to stream music, photos and video to Apple TV®. With iOS 4.3 you can stream additional content including video from third party apps and web sites, videos from the Photos app and previews from the iTunes app to your TV.* AirPlay also allows you to bring photos to life on the TV screen by using one of the stunning new slideshow transitions, or shoot a video on your iPad 2, iPhone or iPod touch and stream it directly from the Photos app to Apple TV.

The new Personal Hotspot feature in iOS 4.3 lets you bring Wi-Fi with you anywhere you go, by allowing you to share an iPhone 4 cellular data connection with up to five devices in a combination of up to three Wi-Fi, three Bluetooth and one USB device.** Joining a Personal Hotspot is easy and once the feature is enabled a status bar displays how many devices are currently connected. Every connection is password protected and when not in use Personal Hotspot turns itself off to save battery life.

More than 10 billion apps have been downloaded from the revolutionary App Store℠ and more than 350,000 apps are available, including more than 65,000 native iPad apps, to consumers in 90 countries. Users of the more than 160 million iOS devices around the world can choose from an incredible range of apps in 20 categories, including games, business, news, sports, health, reference and travel.

Availability
iOS 4.3 will be available to iPad, iPhone and iPod touch users as a free software update on Friday, March 11. iOS 4.3 is compatible with iPad, iPad 2, iPhone 3GS, iPhone 4 (GSM model), plus third and fourth generation iPod touch. For more information please visit www.apple.com.

iOS 4.0.1 Software Update

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Earlier this month Apple released a point release to iOS 4. The iOS 4.0.1 Software Update improves the formula to determine how many bars of signal strength to display on iPhone 4, iPhone 3GS, and iPhone 3G. The real signal strength remains the same, but the bars on iPhone will indicate it more precisely. This is an issue Apple found dealing with the iPhone 4 antenna issue that some users have reported when holding the iPhone 4 in a certain position. I recommend installing this point release as it's both a stabilization release and a fix to the signal strength indicator. So have you upgraded to the latest iPhone 4.

iOS 4 Released Today

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Apple today released its latest iPhone Operating System called iOS 4. iOS 4 previously called iPhone OS works with the iPhone 3G, iPhone 3Gs and the new iPhone 4. If you own an existing iPhone you should download iOS 4 now as many of the new features work on the older iPhones. For the new multitasking feature you need the iPhone 3Gs or 4, however, one of the new cool features, Folders enables you to organized and easily access your Apps. To create a folder, you simply touch and hold an app until it wiggles, then drag it on top of another app. iOS 4 automatically assigns a name to your folder based on the category of the apps inside it, or you can choose your own name. So have you downloaded the latest iOS 4? Let us know your experience with it.

How-To: Take Screenshots on Your iPhone

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Did you know you can take screenshots on your iPhone. Simply press and hold the "Home" button at center bottom of the iPhone, then press and release the "Sleep" button on top right of the iPhone. This causes the iPhone to "flash" white briefly and the image is added to your the Camera Roll Album in your Photos App on your iPhone. You can then flip through the Camera Roll Album to see your screenshots. You can download these screenshots to you iMac.

Here are the screenshots posted to Flickr of the Vancouver 2010 Olympic mascots I took on my iPhone. The mascots show up when you shake your iPhone while in the Official Vancouver 2010 Olympic iPhone App. These mascots are pretty cool. Having the ability to take screenshots on your iPhone is a fantastic feature. Let me know what you think of the Olympic mascots.