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Music discovery is something Apple has done a great job at with its desktop version of iTunes, historically. The company has turned it into a Billboard charts for digital music. The iOS version is quite boring though, and the desktop app has seen better days. In steps Wall of Sound for iOS, which makes music discovery a little more random and entertaining. With a gorgeous design and tiled interaction, it makes you wonder why Apple hasn’t done something this for its own iTunes iOS experience. Discovering Music Wall of Sound brings in artists of all different genres. You can pick and choose the genres or artists you’re interested in, and individual tracks will come up as tiles that you can tap on. There’s no recommendation technology behind it, but the app displays random popular tracks based on iTunes charts. If you choose a song that you own, it will play the full track from your device. Otherwise, a 30 second preview will play and give you a one click option to buy it from Apple’s iTunes. In the way that Apple TV's interface makes it seem like not a big deal to pay $3.99 to rent a movie, Wall of Sound’s serendipitous display of music makes buying tracks seem equally quick and simple. iTunes needs an overhaul Both the desktop and iOS versions of iTunes are in a dire need of an overhaul. The desktop version hasn’t changed much, and getting people to search for tracks to buy, or click on the top downloaded songs simply won’t cut it anymore. Spotify has done a wonderful job with its app and partner Facebook to show you what your friends are listening to, in a way that Apple has failed with its Ping service. For all of the talk with how Apple likes its products to be beautiful, simple, and magical, iTunes feels like a relic from 2001 compared to music discovery services like Pandora and Rdio. To buy music, there needs to be more than the artist and mass appeal to make me put down my 99 cents. The way in which music is displayed, presented, and discovered gives me a closer attachment to the track I’ve found, making it more likely that I’ll purchase it. Apple has some work to do, but luckily Wall of Sound has made the companies job a bit easier with its app.

It’s not often that you see Apple slip up and offer a clue about forthcoming products on its own website, but that is just what happened when the folks at 9to5Mac searched for “macbook pro” on the Apple Online Store and saw it bring up some unexpected results.

Along with the current lineup of MacBook Pro models and among the usual assortment of notebook accessories and parts were references to two “MacBook Pro Memory Models”, each with an estimated ship date of November. They were hyperlinked to the following pages on the Apple Store, both of which currently do not exist:



We dutifully verified this ourselves and came up with the same results, as you can see in the screenshot below:


Although it is always possible that this was some random glitch in the system and isn’t indicative of any future products, the URLs and shipping dates do seem to suggest that that we will be seeing refreshed MacBook Pros with 2.33GHz and 2.4GHz processors arriving sometime in the next month. That is, of course, if the closure of one of Apple’s major notebook casing suppliers in China recently hasn’t thrown a wrench in the plans.

Sources: Header Image Credit

Now that the iPhone is finally available on three major carriers in the US anyone stateside who has not made a purchase yet is likely to be wondering which way to go. There are a lot of factors to consider like cost and plan offerings, but the universal constant is that people like speed.

The iPhone is a great device, but how fast your network delivers information to you is a big limiting factor in how quick the devices will feel. That’s why its important to make an informed decision about which carrier to pick if you want the zippiest iPhone. Thankfully, Jeff Benjamin at iDownloadBlog has gotten his hands on all three versions of the new iPhone 4S available in the US and has done a “head-to-head-to-head” comparison:



The results aren’t all that surprising if you’re familiar with the network technologies involved here. Sprint’s network, although based on CDMA technology like Verizon, is aging and its 3G speeds are normally sub-par even as its reliability is high overall. So it’s not a shock that it runs last in this test. Roughly the order from fastest to slowest is:

1. AT&T
2. Verizon
3. Sprint

However, there is a bit of a catch when it comes to choosing between Verizon and AT&T. Verizon’s CDMA 3G technology is tuned to give great burst rate download speeds, allowing users to quickly snag smaller bites of data. This can make Verizon quicker than AT&T as you saw in the video, but only if you’re snagging smaller chunks of data like websites.

On the tests when larger amounts of data are needed, AT&T’s network pulls ahead in the stretch because it is capable of download speeds up to 14.4Mbps using its HSPA technology (no arguments here about HSPA versus HSPA+ please). The iPhone 4S’s antenna has been optimized to take advantage of this speed and when cruising with a good signal you will download larger files like videos and such much quicker.

This doesn’t answer the question of reliability or overall network coverage, which Verizon and Sprint both have in spades. But if you’re in an area with good and reliable AT&T coverage, you’re going to get the best maximum velocity there.

Let us know what kind of network speeds you’re seeing if you’ve managed to get your iPhone 4S activated.

Early this morning we reported that iPhone 4S users in Australia were running up against activation server issues with carriers. We predicted then that the same issues would crop up once users in the US began picking up their iPhones and it looks like it came true.

Multitudes of AT&T iPhone 4S customers are reporting extensive, many hour long delays in activation of their new devices. The screen reporting activation troubles comes up during the iPhone setup wizard and hangs there, forcing owners to sit and stare at the device longingly, rather than beginning to use it immediately.


Carrier issues have long plagued US iPhone launches as Apple (and AT&T) employees begin activating thousands of iPhones within minutes of the stores opening. The issues normally don’t let up for hours as they are crushed by retry after retry.

The server issues normally calm down after the initial rush but I remember waiting at the Apple store for several hours during the launch of the iPhone 4 while they made attempt after attempt. The iPhone and iPhone 3G were ‘at home’ activations which required you to plug the device into iTunes, although the problems were the same as they contacted AT&T’s servers (both devices launched here in the US first) for activation.

The iPhone 4S’s new PC Free setup allows users to update not only from home, but without even being connected to iTunes. This would be great…if the carrier’s activation servers were up to the task.

At this point, there is not a lot that you can do besides wait for the servers to catch up to demand, but there are a couple of things to try.

Connect the iPhone 4S to iTunes and let it activate over the cable. Although the iPhone’s setup sequence will automatically ask you to activate the iPhone, some are having some success connecting their iPhones to iTunes and allowing it to perform the activation instead. Both of these methods use the same AT&T servers to activate the device, but there could be more consistency here if you have a spotty WiFi connection that drops while communicating.

Visit AT&T’s activation website. Yes, AT&T actually has a dedicated site set up to allow you to activate your phone without it connecting to their servers. Once again, this uses the same backend system, but we’ve been hearing that this is actually a massive improvement in speed from letting the device do it on its own. Once you’ve activated the device, restart your iPhone 4S. Some customers have reported that the website tells them iTunes must activate their device, but we have seen some with success as well. You can get to that site here.



These are both just chances of course and the only real solution will be for AT&T to catch up, but they could work for you. Let us know if either method works in the comments below.

Last week, after the iPhone 4S was announced, without a new body style but still sporting impressive internal upgrades and a brand new voice control feature called Siri, some analysts were ‘disappointed’. If you’re a follower of Apple news, especially of its hardware releases, this probably didn’t come as much of a surprise.

These analysts have little understanding of how Apple works or of the draw that its products have for the general public at large, not just for the technorati that were miffed about the exterior appearance of the phone not changing. Apple appeals to people based on what its devices can do and how they work, which is ‘everything most people need to’ and ‘well’.

This reputation for reliability and for being incredibly easy to use drives the market at large towards Apple as a brand. The amount of people that were truly ‘let down’ by the fact that there was not an external casing are a mere drop in the bucket compared to the millions that pre-ordered and the millions that are likely to get out to an Apple store this weekend to purchase iPhones.

Supporting this is a statement from AT&T that it is set to double its record of iPhone activations in a single day:

As of 4:30 pm ET today, AT&T had already activated a record number of iPhones on our network – and is on-track to double our previous record for activations on a single day. These record volumes may produce slower activations for some customers, though our systems continue to run at record levels.

Sprint’s Product Chief,Fared Adib also this statement:

Sprint today reported its best ever day of sales in retail, web and telesales for a device family in Sprint history with the launch of iPhone 4S and iPhone 4. We reached this milestone at approximately noon CT/1pm ET. The response to this device by current and new customers has surpassed our expectations and validates our customers’ desire for a truly unlimited data pricing plan.

It looks like shareholders liked what they were seeing about the launch as well, as Apple ended up closing up over 3% at a record high of $422.

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