Gadgetory

from an undisclosed location somewhere in the beautiful state of California it's the Apple byte extra crunchy here with you your host Brian Tong riding solo this week my producer extraordinaire Stephen Beecham he is still on break he will return next week this is episode 72 again this is a complimentary piece to the actual Apple byte video podcast that comes out weekly here we can update you with the latest news get a lot more in depth with what's going on and that's what it's all about it's also about you the listeners we have our phone lines we are getting back on track after the break up now that we are listening to them you can always call us at 1-866-376-8255 a memory Convention Center this year a lot closer to Apple's campus and I think that's that might be advantageous because Apple developers may not necessarily want to take a whole day out to get to San Francisco San Jose is a whole lot closer obviously we're going to expect to see the announcement of all the updates to their operating systems iOS 11 Mac OS 10 points 13 as well as TiVo's TV OS and a watch off so we expect to see those I think also no one's really talking about it but if we do not see and a hardware update for iPads in that March April timeline I think there's going to push it out to WWDC the other thing is in the past we used to seeing or we have seen MacBook refreshes at WWDC we may not because the timeline of when the last ones were announced in the late fall we may not see that you so maybe this is a good opportunity to see new iPads at WWDC we will wait to find out again this is normally held in San Cisco but logistics wise it's going to be pretty much the same registration will start on March 27th also Phil Schiller confirms the loop that the venue size is basically about the same for 5000 developers around 1,000 engineers but also the lottery system that is used that has been used for people to attend in the past years that will still be in place so just because you jump on on March 27th doesn't mean you're guaranteed a spot at WWDC you will have to go through the entire lottery system the last time WWDC was held outside of San Francisco was actually back in 2002 it predated the iPhone and so obviously San Jose is probably pretty happy that they're getting the show back but this again will be a big deal at least for the Apple community it always is I tend to find a lot of the cool stuff we see at WWDC because it's like stuff we can download and use right away or at least up that no matter what the hardware is which is becoming less and less innovative and we'll talk about that down in later the show the software is hopefully what gives us some of these cool new bells and whistles so we will see but there you go WWDC will be this year held in San Jose on June the fifth the 9th we also expect the keynote most likely to fall on June the fifth which is the first day of the show so that will all kind of fall in place now when we talk about new tech and new stuff coming out from Apple this is kind of a sad story to me but this report from Bloomberg is talking about one of the weaker products in their product line without a doubt I mean I've talked about it before the Apple TV which even just a few weeks ago Apple put the blame on declining sales of the Apple TV for the fact that their category called other in their earnings report which includes the Apple watch and includes iPods and includes the Apple TV it had it declined in this last quarter so this report from Bloomberg says Apple is vowed to rev Ellucian eyes television but why it hasn't the company is now testing a new Apple TV capable of streaming ultra high-definition Forte but it may not be enough to really take on Amazon Roku and this is my very first complaint when the very first Apple TV or the Newport generation came out I'm like yeah I get it they needed to put I think right now off the top my head it has an a8 processor it didn't have an a nine which at the time for the phones could at least support 4k video my whole thing is why can't we just be able to toss that 4k video or 4k in quotations that we take with our phones directly to our Apple TV to watch on the fly and at that time people like oh no one really has 4k TVs but now 4k TVs are becoming the standard it's more and more prevalent a lot of people jumped on board because of gaming all the TVs that we've seen now coming off this year are going to be affordable I mean we're talking about 4k TVs at a 50-inch size although you may not necessarily get the greatest benefit because really 4k you need a 65 inch or larger to really see those true benefits but let's just okay rewind 4k and HD are TVs they're starting to become more prevalent we're going to see a $500 50-inch one from a company like TCL this year so the pricing is going to be a lot more affordable now Apple TV getting 40 now I mean that's if that's really the only hardware boost that it gets that doesn't excite me we already know that they hired Amazons fire TV basically the head of the product the product manager the chief of Amazon's fire TV project to run the Apple TV operations his name is Timothy toor dhal we talked about that a couple episodes ago so now this fit generation Apple TV bloomberg reports it will be internally codenamed J 105 and the u-box will be a 4k box according to people familiar with the plans but is that enough to upgrade I mean I bought again I've always wanted a 4k shingen Apple TV but the Apple TV is one of the most expensive streaming boxes on the market today you have the fire TV you have Roku sticks and chromecast I mean if I I can't remember up top ahead but I believe apples TV right now is like 149 i mean it's extremely high-priced compare that with really only benefits if it you're in the ecosystem it doesn't have a streaming TV service at least embedded in it you can run playstation view which is in my opinion the best one on the market you can run a Direct TV or the AT&T DirecTV now streaming service which is still in its infancy but Apple doesn't have any additional hooks other than all the other apps that everyone is doing and the Roku platform supports so many video services beyond what the Apple TV does the way the chromecast interacts is a little different we can still tossed up to your TV you have access to pretty much all the services as well the Apple TV just isn't compelling enough unless you're an Apple diehard right now and I've said plenty of times they need it to change that now in another kind of depressing update of the Apple TV project I shouldn't say depressing but just kind of to tell you how this product is Amaya pinion lost its way it's fallen behind it needs to do something to at least be a viable option to say this is the number one set-top box that I want to get whether or not I own Apple products or not but that's just not happening now we know about apples T Apple TVs TV app I have to like slow down so we don't all get confused they that was their latest refresh the TV app that pretty much syncs to some of the channel services as well as iTunes movies and TV shows that you purchase where you can watch them from one device pick up where you left off and watch them from another device the interface is a little more visual but that's all they got with the Apple TV according to this report that initial interface was built with the idea that they would be able to lock down their own streaming service of their own write their own kind of ala carte package that they were trying to negotiate to get a core set of stations and maybe you could customize a few others on the side for around 30 to 40 dollars but we know that those negotiations failed because Apple's like no we want to do it our way TVC was like no we control the content and that's it didn't happen well that watch TV interface was intended and met to be for their streaming service as well as streaming live sports but it didn't happen because Apple couldn't get the deal done and it just sounds so silly because Apple was stuck on this so badly about the way that they want to do their plans they just didn't think look a $30 30 to $40 plan is fine but that's what the PlayStation View is doing already that's what sling TV is doing all the PlayStation view has DVR capability completely build in the interface easy to use you can get a package for like I think 35 $45 starting that has pretty much of course stations but Apple isn't doing that so this whole TV app interface was intended to be used for the idea of Apple gated streaming service that fell through and that didn't happen okay so now you have this kind of mishmash of a TV app that is okay but it's not great we have an Apple TV who's trying to be more like an iPhone now because of the way it looks the whole idea of the apps is instead of being an actual a better straightforward content delivery system and so I think it has an identity problem and it also just isn't efficient enough at what it does and it there's no compelling reason for someone outside of the Apple ecosystem to buy an Apple TV for $149 right that's it's like now I'm on fire TV is under 100 I think chromecast takes around 30 bucks the Roku at least at our higher end product is around 100 but it's not at 150 bucks so and you guys could correct me if I'm wrong so I think it's just really frustrating what's happening with the Apple TV and the Bloomberg sheds light on why some of those things are the way they are but really if they just say 5th generation Apple TV 4k that's it I'm just going to be like ok thanks and then we'll see how many of their services will all of Apple's iTunes movies and TV shows support 4k no so you know some might some will but not the entire thing right now right you have Amazon some of the shows are 4k Netflix some of the shows are 4k the Vudu video service has their own kind of 4k stream but those movies on the iTunes store are not 4k and not all of them will be because that's up to the studios we already see how and also just a bandwidth size that's required for that so I will I will wait and see what they do with the Apple TV that may launch later this year according to the Bloomberg report in addition to that we need content and Apple is jumped on this whole content train we talked about it as far back as the fall of last year Apple is teasing two new shows well Apple has finally showed off the trailers for planet of the apps and carpool karaoke these are the two shows that are going to launch with they're going to be exclusive to the Apple music service which I already have issues with that right so you have to be an apple music subscriber to watch these shows but the first show let's talk about it plan of the apps based on the trailer it's kind of like a mishmash between shark tank Meets The Voice meets app developers and so you have things like you have these app developers they're going to pitch their idea of an app to a panel that includes Jessica Alba will I am Gwyneth Paltrow and get Gary Vaynerchuk entrepreneur with the vaynermedia so you have these four people that's like the panel they see these pitches they will take the developers under their wing that they like kind of like a mentor kind of like the voice and then the final the end game is to help them with their app help them distill it help them mark get it tight so they can do a final pitch in front of VCS to get that big VC money that's the whole goal of the show I actually think it looks pretty intriguing I think there can actually be some real drama for it but that is not enough for me to subscribe to Apple music I'm going to do I'm going to see if I can do another trial run just to check it out I mean obviously there's going to be other ways to get it but that's show number one now carpool karaoke looks more of like obviously it's like a fun romp James Corden was in the trailer but I'm guessing he's just going to be maybe like the very for launched episode that they make free to try and trick people to thinking he's always going to be in it that's not going to be the case but it'll be a combination of celebrities singing in the car together there was like Shaq and John Cena there was John Legend Metallica Alicia Keys so they get they're getting big names but again it's going to be kind of two celebrities rolling out having fun and then they had them go to like these different venues like I mean Metallica is like in a supermarket they there's just like a lot I think John Legend there's like a choir in the laundry mat they're doing other things outside of just being in the car so it'll be a fun show but again I mean the question I have to you guys and gals is would you actually pay for Apple music to see these shows it's a start so I know that they're not going to be coming out full-fledged but I'm just curious like how much how much do they really have to give to us to really convince us now I put up a poll on Twitter for you guys and gals to kind of chime in so I could get a sense of where you at because I'm not always right so I threw up a poll I asked you all would you actually subscribe Apple music just to see plan of the apps and carpool karaoke spin-off show 8% said count me in so this is out of 566 respondents so that's a good chunk I mean that's a good representative amount you're going to really get an idea of what you all are thinking 75% of you said no way 75% of you said no way will you ever subscribe Apple using chess for these two shows and again it's the start 17% of you already have Apple music so you say why not but 8% only 8% of you said count me in so that's less than out of 566 people that's less than 50 people that are basically saying I am I'm going to sign up for Apple music but this all has kind of more long tail implications because I don't like the fact that they're bundling with Apple music right now maybe they have to rebrand that in the future because it isn't just music but it can be it could be compelling if they come out with a couple really good gotta see shows and again I think that's hard because they're going to be in a bidding war with Netflix and Amazon we know that flicks had just invested I think it's either last they did five billion dollars in investment of content I think this year they're bumping that up to six billion we've seen the type of shows that they have what are people talking about now the timeout shows on Netflix the timeout shows on HBO maybe there's one or there's a there's just a handful of Network shows that are getting loved but a lot of the buzz is always like did you see that show on Netflix and then people just binge right through it because they created the whole binging thing Apple doesn't have anything like that so we will wait and see I'm not going to rule them out but we will see also Eddy Cue at the code conference the code conferences where he announced the trailers for plan of the absent carpool karaoke again exclusive to Apple music he also said Apple is working on new features for the for podcast and so he kind of dropped this it you know late last year or in the spring of last year Apple was asking select podcasters how they can improve the podcast iOS iTunes ecosystem so Q said there is going to be absolutely some more things they were going to do they did not say what but Apple would be contributing into the space we'll see how that plays out I'm guessing maybe we'll see something like that at WWDC they'll address what they'll be doing with podcasts I don't think it'll be something like earth-shaking but I think it's always a good thing and maybe there's some cool things that you all can do with a with the show like the Apple bites so there you have it let's guess what we indeed we have a sponsor this week for the show oh man we appreciate the love because that's all from you all listening in we have sponsors pretty much booked out for the next two three months so we are soaked about that so let's get into it our friends at Mara technology has changed the way we run and thanks to smart phone now even casual renders can map their routes create pop-up playlists and track their progress this is all done without looking at your phone right we hate if you're exercising the last thing you want to do is look at your phone kind of like why the will one of the reasons why smart smart wrist wearable upon wearables are out there well there's Mara and it's a hands-free running assist that uses voice recognition and the microphone in your earbuds to help you optimize your runs this is stuff that you can do while you're running you can ask questions about your speed your pace or location have maura play albums and playlists from your music library so you don't have to at least look at your phone there's a lot of people that still run with their phones Mars can tell you how you're doing in comparison to your past runs tell you about weather changes if it's about to rain so we can track your progress by talking by noting all of your hot spots and some of the hard hard parts of your run you can also connect Mars to the Amazon alexis you can asked her about your lifetime statistics so check it out visit Maura a AI to download your free virtual running assistant today that's amara.org and I think that let's bring this on if we can run this bad boy on exclusively on an Apple watch that'd be pretty cool too Ellie's you know if you're into the iOS ecosystem so there you have it Maura ai all right let's jump into more and use a iPhone is always getting tons of rumors more momentum around what is this iPhone 8 thing this iPhone premium thing what are all the models we've talked about in a bunch but here's the latest from KGI who's pretty much dropped about three stories this week about the future iPhone app the iPhone 8 the corner KGI and maangchi quo will feature a new function area in place of touch ID so that touch ID home button that we've talked about we talked about in the past how Apple is looking to remove that completely and put it under the glass according to the support from KGI we won't have a home button anymore but that also means we won't have touch ID and this bottom area of the phone let's be honest it's similar to what's on it Android phones there will be virtual buttons kind of in a row on the bottom of the 5.8 inch premium iPhone this is again according to being chic whoa the plans that they would make up for the lack of touch ID with new biometric technologies but again it would be a row virtual buttons the 5.8 inch phone would really for a usable display real estate would be around 5.15 inches so you're just going to have this bar on the bottom I don't what there is no specifics of how if the bezel of the actual screen will go down all the way there or not but it looks like that at least the display will be five point one five inches with a black bar on the bottom according to this report we'll see we'll see how that goes but that's what KGI is reporting in a follow-up report according to JPMorgan analyst rod Hall we talked about this edge to edge OLED display he says that Apple will feature a front-facing 3d laser scanner for facial recognition we've heard of rumors about this and that would also kind of jive a little bit with what KGI is talking about because there will be no touch ID scanner on the soap on the iPhone eight or this next premium iPhone the remover the home button would need to have something else to unlock our phone be used for payments and a facial recognition 3d laser scanner would be that thing according to supply chain reports three laser scanners have actually increased in volume for that sales of that module within apple supply chain and it could add around 10 to 15 dollars per module to the actual iPhone 8 Bill of Materials so we've also talked about it at the $1000 iPhone you throw in that 3d scanning monitor you throw in an OLED screen you throw in the fact that they're removing the touch ID button larger screen OLED screen 3d laser scanner in addition to everything else that they'll be doing uh we already talked about it iPhone 7 plus with a 256 gigs be nine hundred $69 Alys here in the US so that whole thousand dollar thing is definitely definitely going to want to happen it's just crazy that it would it would be the base price per potentially for this new model also this week uh we know about wireless charging we've been we've joked about it we've really just teased Apple about it for years because it has been out for a year Apple has officially joined the wireless power consortium lending wait to the rumor of wireless charging actually coming to this new iPhone 8 so we know about wireless charging that basically there are standard the only standard wireless charging standard from the wireless power consortium is Chi spell Qi it's so weird because so many people were calling it Qi initially I'm like it's not Qi it's Qi like look it up so they are now part of one of 213 members of the wireless power consortium this was not revealed until this week and we know Apple has been kind of holding out for this long range charging we've talked about stories in the past where they were ideally hoping to use something even like even in their patents if you look them up the base of the iMac that's kind of a transmitter offered for long range charging so that you wouldn't have to put your phone or devices on any actual surface it would charge that way through through inductive charging well now it looks like they're jumping on board they may not have the time or patience to wait for that to actually happen to become effective the whole long-range RF charging so they're going to it it all lines up the fact that at least the premium iPhone 8 will have wireless charging the rumors also say it's going to have a glass backing not an aluminium metal backing which will allow them to make it a phone that can Wireless charge as well so they're part of this wireless power consortium it's not this we've also said look the Apple watch has wireless charging but what Apple did is they kind of tweaked the protocol the keys charging protocol is tweets for the Apple watch that's why you actually can't use any other Qi charging platforms the Apple watch you can only use apples and the Assumption obviously come on it's Apple they're going to do the same exact thing with this iPhone whenever they do so all signs point to the fact it's not official-official obviously that's when the actual phone comes out but that's the next iPhone will have wireless charging Apple is finally part of the wireless power consortium so there you go the WPC you with WPC and finally just kind of an update also in addition to that the Samsung display orders from Apple have started to kind of become a little ridiculous of a few months ago Apple ordered 100 million flexible OLED displays from Samsung Korea the Korea Herald now reports that Apple just ordered an additional 60 million OLED panels from samsung Display making that total of panels 160 million OLED panels so when I hear that we don't again all rumors point to the fact that we're still going to have a 4.7 inch iPhone a 5.5 inch iPhone with generally the same form factor and then this premium iPhone but 160 million seems like they're going all-in for this premium iPhone 8 and based on the numbers of how things sell we know that people are getting like the best iPhone at least for from one of those fans the iPhone 7 plus made had the largest mix of A+ phone ever and that trend is only continuing right to have a better camera with the bouquet effect the larger screen obviously so this if I'm going to get an iPhone in 2017 which obviously I am I'm going to get the new thing I'm not even though I hate the fact that I don't I want a 4.7 inch premium iPhone I just have to accept it that maybe that's not happening who knows we'll find out but Samsung's OLED displays in Apple panels instead of going balls to the wall with this Samsung would be basically supplying about 80% of the total demand for iPhone display panels given that each iPhone series has sold more than 200 million units so it's historically they've sold 200 million units of each iPhone series this eight to meet 200 million units 160 already ordered a 160 OLED panels already ordered that's going directly to the 8 that is directly going to the 8 so we know about this OLED panel 5.8 inch screen a wireframe kind of like a little throwback to the iPhone 4s one of my favorite phone designs of all time or iPhone 4 iPhone 4s but now in a larger slimmer sleeker model that that's what we're talking about all right let's take a little transitional time that's what we're talking about all right let's go check out our voicemails yes we have voicemails this week we were able to get a few and we want to get you all back on track with that again you guys and gals can call us at 1-866-606-8444 God is Spotify a lot I've been using that opera music for about three months so I just wanted to know what you guys choose album you said Nina Spotify instead of ability to the interface better than Apple music is the content which one I know a little bit more information because I made my choice staying with Apple music or maybe trying out Spotify Thank You Jax of the show please hey Juan thank you so much I think that at least I don't want to speak for Beecham but one of the reasons why I'm all about Spotify is because it is free you obviously they're still ads that play within it and also I was turned off by my whole experience with iTunes Match years ago where replaced a lot of my artwork and replace some of the songs with clean versions Apple music had that same issue initially with replacing people's music collection with lower quality files I I liked the idea I think if you're someone who's just like who's started a music collection or someone who's new younger they had didn't rip all their CDs from scratch years ago and works on getting all that original album artwork I think if you're a young person who didn't do that Apple music is good for you streaming music is where it's going but I don't feel comfortable with them tweaking and messing with my music collection like that so you can get Apple music and then you can turn off the matching feature but then you lose a lot of the functionality music I think Apple music is great if you're in the ecosystem it's perfectly fine there's actually nothing wrong with it but the way that I deal with my music in the fact that I still to this day and it sounds silly I still like buying my music that's kind and I'm old-school like that that's kind of weird so Spotify I do I it's not as integrated but I'd have to open an app I do like the curation of their playlist I think it I just tend to feel like it's a little better but that's just my personal that's just my personal feel with Spotify so that's why I'm on and again the biggest the biggest differentiator is that it is free all right let's check out beau talking about how much you would actually pay for an iPhone hi guys oh well it kills me to say it if the new iPhone is even up to $1200 and I like it I'm probably still going to buy it just because I've been Apple washing 2007 and become an important part of my life and my everyday work so hate to say it but probably true Thanks great show well that's hilarious because I had a lot of people say you know about a sir when I asked how many of you all would pay a thousand dollars for an iPhone I would say about assertive people are like totally comfortable with it because ultimately they never have to pay $1000 or more upfront it's broken down to monthly payments to them it's like elves pay like ten bucks more maybe have one less coffee and have one more dinner that's just ramen instead of a real did a real grown grown person's dinner so up to 1200 Bo I mean that that's that's some Apple loyalty right there but I think that if this new iPhone is everything that everyone dreams is dreaming about and if it does deliver I would I would argue and say yeah I probably would because it's spread out over payments I would probably buy a $1,000 iPhone if it delivers but you know if they do a 4.7 inch version that's cheaper which no one has said they way I would probably do that one but I think a lot of people but first I said like $1,000 hell no but I think a lot of I phone lists are going to easily easily do that and when I say i phone Royalists about a third of you are the hardcore you're going to get it no matter what so yeah I think it'll be interesting to see how people react to it again nothing is official but there's so much stuff out there that almost seems like fact we'll just have to wait and see all right everybody thanks so much for listening and hanging out with us again with the Apple byte extra crunchy Stephen Beecham will return next week with myself you can always call us at