Orange Romania will sell iPhone 3G on 22 August

Orange Romania, part of France’s mobile telephony operator Orange, on Wednesday said the new iPhone 3G handset, to be launched in Romania on August 22, will sell for prices ranging between EUR179 and EUR489, based on the type of model and subscription.

Orange is the only mobile telecom operator to sell the iPhone 3G terminal in Romania, following a deal France’s Orange signed with U.S. Apple Inc. in May to sell its iPhone in several European countries, including Romania.

Apart from Romania, Orange said it will sell the iPhone in Austria, Belgium, the Dominican Republic, Egypt, Jordan, Poland, Portugal, Slovakia, Switzerland and its African markets later this year.

Apple launched the iPhone in the U.S. in June last year. The handset combines the features of a mobile phone, web browser and audio and video players.

Orange Romania is the top operator on the local mobile telephony market, with 10.01 million customers reported end June.

The company reported a 9% hike in its first half revenues to EUR628 million.

Orange will bring iPhone 3G to Romania on August 22

Bucharest - August 6, 2008. Orange Romania today announced it will bring iPhone 3G to Romania on August 22. iPhone 3G combines all the revolutionary features of iPhone plus 3G networking that is twice as fast*, built-in GPS for expanded location-based mobile services, and iPhone 2.0 software which includes support for Microsoft Exchange ActiveSync and runs hundreds of third party applications available through the new App Store.

"We are excited to be the only network provider to offer iPhone 3G in Romania from August 22. With our 3G/HSDPA capabilities and widespread broadband coverage, Orange customers in Romania will be able to enjoy the full iPhone 3G experience,” said Richard Moat, CEO Orange Romania.

Orange customers are welcomed to attend the official launch of iPhone 3G at midnight on August 22. The doors of six Orange shops across the country will open simultaneously: Orange concept store in Bucharest and the Orange shops in Iasi (Anastasie Panu Blvd.), Cluj (21 Decembrie Blvd.), Brasov (Muresenilor St.), Timisoara (Republicii Blvd.) and Constanta (St. Stefan cel Mare).

Starting August 7, customers can register online their pre-order at www.orange.ro/iphone.

The combination of widespread EDGE, Wi-Fi, 3G and HSDPA networks mean customers can fully enjoy the mobile Internet almost wherever they go. In addition, Orange will offer a range of new tariffs plans and benefits for iPhone 3G customers. Details of pricing and availability will be announced soon.

3G iPhone

Apple CEO Steve Jobs unveiled the iPhone 3G to an appreciative audience during the opening keynote speech at the company's Worldwide Developers Conference on Monday.
The new iPhone, sporting a thinner and sleeker look, will support faster 3G (third-generation) broadband wireless networks and come with built-in GPS (Global Positioning System) capabilities, Jobs said. Support for 3G networks will enable the new iPhone to download data up to 2.8 times faster than the earlier model, Jobs said. Built-in GPS will make it easier for users to navigate roads.

The iPhone 3G will come with a 3.5-inch screen and have better battery life, with talk time of five hours, stand-by time of 300 hours, six hours of high-speed browsing time, 20 hours of audio and seven hours of video, Jobs said. Some who had previously bought iPhones complained about its battery life and that was a problem that Apple needed to solve with the new iPhone, Jobs said.

While Jobs said the phone is "even thinner at the edges," it is just a hair thicker than its predecessor. The 3G iPhone is 0.48 inch, or 12.3 mm, thick, while the previous version is 0.46 inch, or 11.6 mm, deep.

Quicker data downloads and lower prices are key to greater adoption of iPhones worldwide, Jobs said. Apple has cut the price by half to make the new iPhone more affordable for users, so that the 8GB model will sell for $199 (£101) and the 16GB model for $299. The company found that 56 percent of people surveyed wouldn't buy the earlier iPhone because they found it expensive.

The phone will ship on 11 July in North America and will eventually be rolled out in 70 countries, including India, China, Singapore and Australia, Jobs said.

iPhone and 3G iPhone will be available at Orange locations across Romania soon. More details here

Here is a hands-on review of the new iPhone

Source

Here are some videos with Steve Jobs at WWDC08 presenting the new iPhone:






Here is the ad for the new iPhone:

WWDC08

The groundbreaking innovations of Mac OS X Leopard and iPhone OS offer two revolutionary development platforms for developers and IT professionals. Immerse yourself with information-rich sessions where Apple engineers go in-depth on the innovative technologies that power the features of these sophisticated platforms. Bring your code to the Labs and work one-to-one with Apple engineers, applying development methods and best-practices you gain from sessions to enhance your application.

From June 9 - 13, WWDC will host the best of the Apple developer universe — with attendees representing all corners of the globe. Take advantage of this unique opportunity to experience a community atmosphere filled with your industry peers.

Apple confirmed that its Worldwide Developer Conference (WWDC), held 9-13 June 2008 in San Francisco, has sold out for the first time in the history of the event.

3G iPhone will be launched at WWDC08 after several months of secrecy.

Apple is likely to release its new 3G iPhone and announce a new software platform for the phone when CEO Steve Jobs takes the stage at the company's Worldwide Developers Conference on Monday.

The new iPhone will feature GPS (Global Positioning System) services and a thinner form factor, according to Shaw Wu, an analyst at American Technology Research. The new iPhone will also have thinner casing and an improved virtual keyboard with like multi-touch technology, Wu wrote.

Pricing for the 3G iPhone may be £25 to £50 cheaper than the current iPhone, Wu wrote.

iPhone boosts data traffic in Germany

Speaking at Deutsche Telekom's AGM, the CEO, Rene Obermann, let slip that the iPhone had done wonders to T-Mobile Germany's data traffic. Obermann revealed that German iPhone customers use mobile internet services thirty times more than other cell phone subscribers, while one third of all T-Mobile iPhone customers have chosen the most expensive plan.

This level of success perhaps prompted T-Mobile's CEO, Hamid Akhavan, to state that the company expected to remain the sole seller of the handset in Germany. "We have a very good relationship with Apple... at least in Germany it is exclusive, and we expect it to remain as such," he said. 'If and when there is a 3G iPhone we expect to have it exclusively in Germany as well," he added.

While T-Mobile is reported to have sold over 100,000 iPhones since last November, Apple has recently started to make deals with more than one operator in all the major European countries, with the exception of Germany.

Source FierceWireless

Orange brings iPhone in Romania this year

Bucharest, May 16, 2008. Orange today announced a new agreement with Apple to bring the iPhone to Orange customers in Romania, Austria, Belgium, the Dominican Republic, Egypt, Jordan, Poland, Portugal, Slovakia, Switzerland and Orange’s African markets.

„We believe the Romanian market is offering a real potential for the adoption of the latest communication novelties, and Orange is the leader of this market with over 10 million customers. We are glad we will be able to offer this year the iPhone device to our customers”, stated Vanina Ungureanu, Product Division Manager at Orange Romania.

iPhone in Asia

Singapore Telecoms announced that it has signed a deal with Apple to carry its iPhone on its networks in Singapore, India, Phillipines and Australia some time later this year. Singapore Telecoms owns SingTel, Bharti Airtel, Globe and Optus in each of the respective markets.
The telecom did not disclose other information about the deal.


iPhone stats

Avaible in:
USA (AT&T)
UK (Telefonica O2)
Ireland (Telefonica O2)
Germany (T-Mobile)
Austria (T-Mobile)
France (Orange)

Planned in:
Singapore (Singtel)
India (Bharti Airtel & Vodafone)
Philippines (Globe)
Australia (Optus & Vodafone)
Italy (TIM & Vodafone)
Czech Republic (Vodafone)
Egypt (Vodafone)
Greece (Vodafone)
Portugal (Vodafone)
New Zealand (Vodafone)
South Africa (Vodacom)
Turkey (Vodafone)
Canada (Rogers)
Latin America (unspecified but America Movil has the rights)

Orange brings Macbook Air in Romania

Orange launched at CERF 2008 a new portable broadband solution. The thinnest laptop in the world, the Apple MacBook Air, the smallest USB modem in the world, Option ICON 225 and Internet Unlimited Start were created for the wireless world.

You can Connect to the internet wherever you are, at 3G+ speeds of up to 3.6 Mbps in over 300 localities in Romania and at EDGE speeds of up to 220 Kbps in the rest of the country.

The subscription fee starts from 10 euros. The price of the MacBook Air is 1689 euros including VAT.

IRIS, the Romanian distribuitor for Apple, will sell MacBook Air only after 2 weeks to those who pre-ordered him online.

More about this: Orange

24 Gold&Diamonds MacBook Pro

Computer Choppers made a 24 karat gold MacBook Pro with a diamond encrusted Apple logo on it. That is just insane. I don't know who has enough money to buy it. Maybe some arab or chinese computer geeks might like it.

100,000 Apple iPhone SDKs Downloaded So Far

Apple says that over 100,000 iPhone software development kits have been downloaded since March 6, not even a week ago. The announcement below is atypical of Apple: following the standard chest-puffing from execs such as worldwide marketing SVP Phil Schiller, you'll find exec quotes from Namco, NetSuite, PopCap, Rocket Mobile, Six Apart and THQ...

read more | digg story

Apple iPhone SDK

Apple launched iPhone SDK. The iPhone Developer Program provides a complete and integrated process for developing, debugging, and distributing your free, commercial, or in-house applications for iPhone and iPod touch. Complete with development resources, real-world testing on iPhone, and distribution on the App Store, you have everything you need to go from code to customer.

To access the SDK you need to register. There are 2 versions of SDK: a free one and a professional one.

Though Apple states that the iPhone software development kit requires an “Intel processor-based Mac running Mac OS X Leopard,” developers have found that — with a little leg-work — the SDK also runs on PowerPC-based Macs.

By default, the iPhone SDK package available free from Apple’s site will run on a PowerPC-based Mac but omit the iPhone SDK-related files, installing only Xcode 3.1 beta and a series of other files. This routine is easily circumvented via the shareware tool Pacifist, which can be used to force an installation of the entire SDK package on PowerPC-based Macs.

The iPhone SDK includes a new version of Dashcode (v. 2.0 Beta) that allows creation of Web apps for the iPhone. When you click run, these Web apps launch in the Aspen Simulator. The tool also has support for bundling home icon images into the deployed Web app.

Preset styles include the standard sliding-style “Browser” interface. Code snippets include gauges, indicators, forward and back buttons, form elements and more.

Sun: We'll put Java on the iPhone

Sun is developing a Java Virtual Machine for Apple's iPhone enabling Java applications to run on the popular mobile device. The company plans to release the JVM some time after June.

The JVM is to be based on the Java Micro Edition (ME) version of Java, said Eric Klein, vice president of Java marketing at Sun. Apple had not shown interest in enabling Java to run on the iPhone, but Sun plans to step in and do the job itself.

"Now, the iPhone is open" as a target platform, Klein said. The free JVM would be made available via Apple's AppStore marketplace for third-party applications.

"We're going to make sure that the JVM offers the Java applications as much access to the native functionality of the iPhone as possible," he said.

Besides Java games, developers could bring over enterprise applications such as ERP or CRM to the iPhone, said Klein. Apple's iTouch, which features iPhone capabilities minus telephony, also will be supported by the JVM.

"Once our JVM is on the phone, we anticipate that a large number of Java applications would run on the phone," Klein said.

"We're going to work to make sure that the JVM offers the Java applications as much access to the native functionality of the iPhone as possible," said Klein.

By bringing the JVM to the iPhone, Java capabilities in area such as SSL security could be brought to Apple's platform, said analyst Chris Silva of Forrester Research.

"I think going forward, with the SDK, it takes out of Apple's control which applications are 'right' for the iPhone," Silva said.

Sun came to the conclusion it could make a JVM work on the iPhone after taking 24 hours to look at information on Apple's SDK. Sun saw nothing in the public statements preventing the JVM from being one of the applications enabled on the iPhone, said Klein. Apple released the SDK in conjunction with the beta release if its iPhone 2.0 software; the general release of iPhone 2.0 is scheduled for June.
Future plans could include extending more sophisticated Java Standard Edition (SE) and JavaFX technologies to the iPhone, Klein said.

"It's a new platform for us. We might be able to bring additional technologies onto the iPhone and the iTouch," Klein said.

Developers, Klein said, have built great applications, and until now they have been unable to get them running on the iPhone. Sun previously has expressed its desire that Java be supported on the iPhone.

See more on Sun.com

Gartner: 10 trends of IT industry

Gartner 's predictions for IT Organisations 2008:

1. Mac will double its market share

By 2011, Apple will double its U.S. and Western Europe unit market share in computers. Apple's gains in computer market share reflect as much on the failures of the rest of the industry as on Apple's success. Apple is challenging its competitors with software integration that provides ease of use and flexibility; continuous and more frequent innovation in hardware and software; and an ecosystem that focuses on interoperability across multiple devices (such as iPod and iMac cross-selling).

2. Half of business travelers won't take their laptops

By 2012, 50 per cent of traveling workers will leave their notebooks at home in favour of other devices. Even though notebooks continue to shrink in size and weight, traveling workers lament the weight and inconvenience of carrying them on their trips. Vendors are developing solutions to address these concerns: new classes of Internet-centric pocketable devices at the sub-$400 level; and server and Web-based applications that can be accessed from anywhere. There is also a new class of applications: portable personality that encapsulates a user's preferred work environment, enabling the user to recreate that environment across multiple locations or systems.

3. Open source will penetrate 80% of enterprise software

By 2012, 80 per cent of all commercial software will include elements of open source technology. Many open source technologies are mature, stable, and well supported. They provide significant opportunities for vendors and users to lower their total cost of ownership and increase returns on investment. Ignoring this will put companies at a serious competitive disadvantage. Embedded open-source strategies will become the minimal level of investment that most large software vendors will find necessary to maintain competitive advantages during the next five years.

4. A third of all software purchased will be by subscription

By 2012, at least one-third of business application software spending will be as service subscription instead of as product license. With software as service (SaaS), the user organization pays for software services in proportion to use. This is fundamentally different from the fixed-price perpetual license of the traditional on-premises technology. Endorsed and promoted by all leading business applications vendors (Oracle, SAP, Microsoft) and many Web technology leaders (Google, Amazon), the SaaS model of deployment and distribution of software services will enjoy steady growth in mainstream use during the next five years.

5. Many new businesses will buy IT infrastructure as a service

By 2011, early technology adopters will forgo capital expenditures and instead purchase 40 per cent of their IT infrastructure as a service. Increased high-speed bandwidth makes it practical to locate infrastructure at other sites and still receive the same response times. Enterprises believe that as service oriented architecture (SOA) becomes common, cloud computing will take off, thus untying applications from specific infrastructure. This trend to accepting commodity infrastructure could end the traditional lock-in with a single supplier and lower the costs of switching suppliers. It means that IT buyers should strengthen their purchasing and sourcing departments to evaluate offerings. They will have to develop and use new criteria for evaluation and selection and phase out traditional criteria.

6. Power efficiency will become a key criteria in IT purchases

By 2009, more than one third of IT organizations will have one or more environmental criteria in their top six buying criteria for IT-related goods. Initially, the motivation will come from the wish to contain costs. Enterprise data centers are struggling to keep pace with the increasing power requirements of their infrastructures. And there is substantial potential to improve the environmental footprint, throughout the life cycle, of all IT products and services without any significant trade-offs in price or performance. In future, IT organizations will shift their focus from the power efficiency of products to asking service providers about their measures to improve energy efficiency.

7. CO2 footprint will become part of PC purchasing criteria

By 2010, 75 per cent of organizations will use full life cycle energy and CO2 footprint as mandatory PC hardware buying criteria. Most technology providers have little or no knowledge of the full life cycle energy and CO2 footprint of their products. Some technology providers have started the process of life cycle assessments, or at least were asking key suppliers about carbon and energy use in 2007 and will continue in 2008. Most others using such information to differentiate their products will start in 2009 and by 2010 enterprises will be able to start using the information as a basis for purchasing decisions. Most others will stat some level of more detailed life cycle assessment in 2008.

8. Green sourcing will drive vendors to provide green

By 2011, suppliers to large global enterprises will need to prove their green credentials via an audited process to retain preferred supplier status. Those organizations with strong brands are helping to forge the first wave of green sourcing policies and initiatives. These policies go well beyond minimizing direct carbon emissions or requiring suppliers to comply with local environmental regulations. For example, Timberland has launched a Green Index environmental rating for its shoes and boots. Home Depot is working on evaluation and audit criteria for assessing supplier submissions for its new EcoOptions product line.

9. End user preferences will drive half of all IT purchases

By 2010, end-user preferences will decide as much as half of all software, hardware, and services acquisitions made by IT. The rise of the Internet and the ubiquity of the browser interface have made computing approachable, and individuals are now making decisions about technology for personal and business use. Because of this, IT organizations are addressing user concerns through planning for a global class of computing that incorporates user decisions in risk analysis and innovation of business strategy.

10. 3D printers will grow 100-fold

Through 2011, the number of 3D printers in homes and businesses will grow 100-fold over 2006 levels. The technology lets users send a file of a 3D design to a printer-like device that will carve the design out of a block of resin. A manufacturer can make scale models of new product designs without the expense of model makers. Or consumers can have models of the avatars they use online. Ultimately, manufacturers can consider making some components on demand without having an inventory of replacement parts. Printers priced less than $10,000 have been announced for 2008, opening up the personal and hobbyist markets.

Source: Gartner

MacBook Air is not fast

First benchmarks showed that MacBook Air is the slowest Apple machine on the block. Primate Labs recently benchmarked the miniature laptop, and found that performance was around 80- to 85-percent of that of a 2GHz MacBook. While the Air pulled ahead slightly in memory and stream performance, it was lacking in other areas.





See more info here:
Primate Labs
CrunchGear
Gizmodo
MacWorld
EndGadget

ThinkPad X300 challenges MacBook Air

The new ThinkPad X300 is one of the thinnest, lightest full-function notebook in its class.


The X300 starts at only 1.33 kg – just 1.42 kg including the integrated DVD burner.
Easy portability with convenience, too. X300 comes with 3 USB ports plus external display, headphone/line-out and microphone/line-in.


X300 uses a lightweight LED backlit display that’s easy on the eyes; the integrated camera option is an X Series first.
Legendary ThinkPad design on the X300 includes the full-size keyboard, TrackPoint and UltraNav pointing device.

Dual speakers give X300 rich, stereo sound not typical in most ultraportables.

The ThinkPad X300 is a 13.3" screen ultra thin-and-light notebook designed for the traveling business type of person -- the executive road warrior if you will. But let's be honest, suit or no suit, with the type of technology and cool engineering crammed into the X300 everyone's going to be a little bit curious about this notebook, and envious of anybody that has one.

Weighing started at 2.93 pounds (1.33 kilograms). Lenovo claims ThinkPad X300 is more feature-rich than Apple's 3-pound MacBook Air. Lenovo has included three USB drives and an ultrathin DVD burner, while MacBook Air has only one USB drive and no optical drive. With a DVD-RW drive, the X300 weighs 3.13 pounds, Lenovo said.


The laptop measures 0.73 inches (1.85 cm) at its thinnest point by 0.92 inches (2.34 cm) at its thickest point, bigger in comparison to MacBook Air, which measures 0.16 inches (0.4 cm) at its thinnest part and 0.76 inches (1.93 cm) at its thickest part.

Targeted at business users and consumers, the laptop uses 25 percent less power than previous ThinkPad models with a 64G-byte solid-state storage drive for data storage, a 13.3-inch LED-backlit display and use of a lithium-polymer battery, Lenovo said.

The lithium-polymer chemistry provides better battery life than standard lithium-ion batteries found in most laptops today, said Tom Ribble, director of Thinkpad product marketing at Lenovo. The system supports up to 4G bytes of memory and includes integrated graphics, a digital camera, and wired and wireless networking. It includes both touchpad and trackpoint scrolling capabilities.

The system will come with WiMax capabilities later this year with Intel's updated Centrino platform, according to Lenovo. The buyer may choose that the machine come preloaded either with Windows XP Professional or Windows Vista.

The X300 is powered by Intel's Core 2 Duo SL7100 LV low-voltage chip, operating at 1.2GHz. Like the Core 2 Duo processor specially developed for Apple's MacBook Air, Intel shrunk the SL7100 LV processor to make it 60 percent smaller than standard-sized processors belonging to Intel's Merom family. The chip is manufactured using the 65-nanometre process, like other Merom processors.

Although the size is the same, the SL7100 LV chip consumes less power. It uses 12 watts of power, according to processor details provided by Intel. The Core 2 Duo processor for MacBook Air uses 20 watts of power, while operating at 1.6GHz to 1.8GHz. Fujitsu also uses the SL7100 LV chip in its ultraportable LifeBook P8010 laptop, which started shipping in the US this month.

Lenovo has pumped the latest technology into its laptop that both consumers and business users will appreciate, Ribble said.

Prices for the X300 start at US$2,799, and it is available through Lenovo's website and through retail partners. It was not yet listed on Lenovo's website at the time of the announcement.

See more info here:
Lenovo Thinkpad X300 Series Confirmed
Backstory and Teardown of the Lenovo X300 (Components By Weight!)
ThinkPad X300 Now Available for Just $2,404
Lenovo ThinkPad X300 First Thoughts Review

Telekinesis: Free iPhone Remote

Telekinesis is an open-source application from Google, that will allow you to do just this. Install the software on your Mac, connect to it with your iPhone, and perform some or all of these functions:

• Stream music and videos from your computer
• Screen capture with mouse click and basic typing support
• Simple iTunes Remote control
• Browse your files
• Run applescript remotely
• iSight image capture
• Basic Spotlight search
• Easily create and add more applications

How to use it:

• Run iPhone Remote (Requires OS X 10.4)
• Choose a web login/password
• Open to https://:5010 from your iPhone. If you want to access your computer from outside of your local network, you may need to configure your router or firewall to support it.

You can find more here




To control your computer with your iPod touch there is also UltraVNA.
You can find it here: UVNC
Watch these videos first:

Apple Takes Third of Global Mobile Market

In less than half a year, Apple, Inc. has become the world's number-three seller of smart mobile devices, as Apple's iPhone took off. But Apple's exclusive carrier arrangements for the iPhone show signs of strain with users unlocking Apple's iPhone. Analysts say Apple needs to work on its smartphone to catch up to the Blackberry and Nokia.
Apple bested Motorola to grab third place in global fourth-quarter sales of smart mobile devices, according to market researcher Canalys.
With 2.3 million iPhones sold in the quarter, Apple has a 6.5 percent global market share of smart devices, still substantially behind BlackBerry maker Research in Motion, with 4 million units sold and a 11.5 percent market share, and global leader Nokia with 18.8 million unit sales and a 53 percent market share. In the U.S., the iPhone accounted for 28 percent of the market, advancing on RIM with 41 percent and blowing past Palm with only 9 percent.
"When you consider that it launched part way through the year, with limited operator and country coverage, and essentially just one product, Apple has shown very clearly that it can make a difference and has sent a wake-up call to the market leaders," said Pete Cunningham, Canalys senior analyst.

iPhone vs Nokia

Meanwhile, Apple on Tuesday doubled the storage capacity of the iPhone to 16GB and the iPod Touch to 32GB. Apple originally offered 4GB and 8GB versions of the iPhone. The beefed-up devices come with software previewed at Macworld last month, which among other things allows them to identity the user's location.
Can Apple build on its success to seriously compete with Nokia for dominance of the smartphone space? To do so, it will have to expand its coverage and build out its product portfolio, Cunningham said. "A broad, continually refreshed portfolio is needed to retain and grow share in this dynamic market," he said.
Apple will be a strong contender for the crown over the next several years, said Tim Bajarin, principal analyst with Creative Strategies, in an e-mail. "While Nokia is a key player, Apple is clearly going down a path to challenge them and all the other players in the area of smartphones," he said.
In addition, the iPod Touch is "one of Apple's major strategic advantages over their competitors in the smartphone and MP3 music-player markets," Bajarin said. "I expect Apple to extend this multi-touch user interface to even more Apple-created products in the future."

Gray Market in Asia

Of concern is Apple's strategy of exclusive relationships with wirless carriers. "It will also need to ensure that the exclusive relationships that got it so far so quickly do not prove to be a limit on what it can achieve," Cunningham said.
Reports of a huge gap between iPhone sales and service subscriptions with AT&T, Apple's exclusive carrier in the U.S., have raised concerns that consumers are revolting against Apple's restraints. Apple reported selling 3.7 million iPhones, but AT&T said it had only received 2 million sign-ups. If a third of all iPhones were sold to consumers who unlocked them for use on other carriers, that would indicate a fundamental flaw in Apple's business model.
But Gene Munster of Piper Jaffray told The New York Times last week that his contacts had discovered that 40 percent of people buying iPhones at Apple Stores were buying more than one at a time. "The majority of the people who were buying more than one phone were Asian, and they were bringing small buses of people who all buy more than one phone," Munster said. He speculated that the phones are being sold in Asia, where it is much harder to purchase an iPhone, since Apple has yet to launch a carrier deal there.
"I don't know how many iPhones are really missing, but I do know many of them were bought with the intention of breaking them so they can be used on other carriers' networks, especially in Asia and Europe," Bajarin agreed. "But don't expect Apple to change their carrier-based revenue-sharing model any time soon. They will just make it harder to break the iPhone over time."

Apple Patches iPhone Security Vulnerability

Following news that Apple's latest firmware update for the iPhone breaks the "jailbreak" software that many users had installed to run third-party applications or use a carrier other than AT&T, nCircle's Andrew Storms said that, with the iPhone SDK on its way, it's best to take advantage of the security patch and sit tight for a few months.
Apple has pushed out its 1.1.2 firmware update for the iPhone and iPod touch, which fixes a bug in rendering TIFF images. The bug has been used by several groups to create software hacks for unlocking the phone and for "jailbreaking" the phone to run third-party applications. It also made the iPhone extremely vulnerable to malicious exploits.
Previous versions of Apple's firmware used a version of the libtiff library that was susceptible to buffer overflow attacks. "By enticing a user to view a maliciously crafted TIFF image, an attacker may cause an unexpected application termination or arbitrary code execution," Apple's update page explained.
While the upgrade fixes a serious security Relevant Products/Services hole, it also breaks the "jailbreak" software many users have installed to run third-party applications or use the phone with a different carrier.
But hackers have already come up with a way around the update. Users can run software called Oktoprep before upgrading to 1.1.2. An outfit called Conceited Software now offers a jailbreak program to keep the phone open for third-party apps.

Hacks Not Worth the Risk

To get the benefits of the 1.1.2 upgrade without losing functionality, users can install Oktoprep on a phone running the 1.1.1 firmware. Once installed, it's safe to upgrade to 1.1.2. But users who have unlocked their devices might wind up with an iBrick if they upgrade without installing the latest hacks.
Apple has announced that it will release a software development kit for the iPhone in February, but until then the company appears locked in a cat and mouse game with the unlockers.
"For the mass majority of consumers, there is no high value to gain in risking another iPhone brick," Andrew Storms, director of security operations for nCircle, said in an e-mail. "With the SDK on its way, it's best to upgrade, take advantage of the security patch, and sit tight for a few months."
Even with the TIFF bug fix, enterprises should remain wary of the iPhone, Storms said. "Until Apple puts forth centralized configuration, compliance, and auditing mechanisms for the iPhone, it will just be a great gadget that every executive wishes their I.T. security staff would endorse," he said.
Besides fixing the TIFF hole, the latest upgrade offers a few new features. They include support for more languages, a battery indicator in iTunes, and a custom option for ringtones.

China Mobile in Talks for iPhone

In other iPhone news, Apple is in preliminary negotiations with China Mobile to sell the iPhone in China, Wang Jianzhou, China Mobile's CEO, announced at an industry conference on Tuesday. "Our customers like this kind of fashionable product," he said.
Another China Mobile executive, Huang Haibo, told Agence France-Press, "Of course, we hope to bring the iPhone to China, but for the time being we're only in preliminary contact with Apple, and we have not made any concrete progress yet."
But Wang also said he finds the revenue-sharing model that Apple has won with carriers in the U.S. and Europe less than fashionable. "We still think we can maintain the operator-centric model because we have the customers, the end users," he said.
China Mobile is the world's largest carrier with 350 million subscribers, so it would be an excellent partner for Apple in China. But, as Wang said, that many subscribers also gives the company substantial bargaining power with Apple.
Apple is expected to launch the iPhone in Asia in 2008 and is in negotiations with several carriers across the region. Apple plans to launch its first Apple Store in China soon.

Intel's Silverthorne Chip Could Power Apple's Future

Intel's new Silverthorne chip is ideal for ultra-portable laptops like Apple, Inc.'s MacBook Air, but Intel may be laying the foundation for future Apple processors. Intel gave a hint of Apple's future in one of 14 papers it will present at the International Solid-State Circuit Conference in San Francisco.
Just because a paper is technical doesn't mean marketing wasn't involved. A good example is Intel's presentation Monday at the International Solid-State Circuit Conference in San Francisco on its upcoming Silverthorne mobile processor. The title: "A Sub-1W to 2W Low-Power IA Processor for Mobile Internet Devices in 45nm High-ÊMetal-Gate CMOS."
Sounds geeky, but consider the phrase "mobile Internet devices." That appears to align with Apple's vision of the iPhone and iPod Touch as "the first mainstream Wi-Fi mobile platform, running all kinds of mobile applications."
But while Silverthorne draws 10 to 15 times less power than Intel's Centrino laptop processor and is "easily the lowest-power laptop-style processor that Intel has produced," Charles King, principal analyst for Pund-IT, said in a telephone interview that the new chip is far better suited to ultra-portable laptop computers than handheld devices.

Air, Not iPhone

So for Apple, one of several manufacturers committed to adopting Silverthorne, think MacBook Air, not iPhone, King said.
Indeed, Intel is aiming the first version of Silverthorne at the ultra-portable market -- "potentially a very interesting market, but one that's still evolving," King said. "Hats off to Intel. It's a very interesting development, potentially very valuable" for the next generation of mobile devices.
The problem is that price and battery constraints have made ultra-portables of limited interest for most consumers. And while Silverthorne may dramatically reduce a laptop's power consumption, it's just part of the problem.
"Processor power consumption pales in comparison to display and hard-drive power consumption," King said. Silverthorne "is not a magic bullet," he added.

Foundation for Smartphones

That's not to say that Intel won't deliver smaller and more powerful versions. "Maybe Silverthorne is a step toward a hybrid device that would blend mobile-phone capabilities with tablet or laptop capabilities," King said.
Exactly the point, Intel says. Silverthorne is not just a chip for new laptops, it's an architecture that gets Intel on track to compete in the smartphone market.
"The low-power microarchitecture we're going to be rolling out next week is establishing a foundation that will spawn multiple processors in different segments," Pankaj Kedia, a director at Intel, told Computerworld. "We believe mobile Internet devices is a big market -- a high-growth market."
He added, "We think more and more consumers will want to carry the Internet with them in their pocket. Silverthorne will be the heartbeat of this category. From a growth perspective, Silverthorne is very important."
So Apple's interest in Silverthorne is intriguing. The iPhone, like other smart phones, uses an architecture from ARM. If the Silverthorne platform can eventually compete with that architecture, Intel may be able to get much more business from Apple.

Apple Cuts iPhone, iPod Touch Production

Mac sales appear to be rising, but Craig Berger of FBR Research says Apple, Inc. has reduced orders for iPhones and iPods for the second time in two months. Apple's iPod Touch may have the weakest sales since it is less than an Apple iPhone. Another report finds that Apple iPhone calls are coming from countries without Apple contracts.
Are Apple sales in trouble? Two research analysts have reported in recent days that Apple is aggressively cutting back production on iPods and iPhones, while increasing production on Mac computers.
Craig Berger, an analyst with FBR Research, told clients in a research note this week that Apple has reduced orders for iPhones and iPods for the second time in two months. Berger concludes that Apple is experiencing weak sell-through in the fourth calendar quarter of 2007 or in the early going this year.
"For both iPods and iPhones, we believe Apple was previously targeting a roughly 50 percent quarter-over-quarter decline for first quarter units, whereas we now think the firm is targeting a 60 percent quarter-over-quarter unit decline for first-quarter units," he wrote.

iPod Touch Weakness

It seems that the iPod Touch may have seen the weakest sales. Berger reported production orders for the Touch have fallen the most. The device may suffer from being less than an iPhone, since it has no phone capabilities but is substantially more expensive than Apple's music-playing iPhones. The touch relies on Wi-Fi for connectivity, so users who aren't in range of a Wi-Fi connection simply can't get online.
Berger also said MacBook chip orders in the first quarter look to be down 50 percent compared with the fourth quarter of 2007. But iMac orders are up 35 percent compared with previous checks.
Apple just announced new, higher-capacity versions of both the iPhone and iPod Touch, so the production cutbacks may have been in preparation for the new models. Another possibility, more remote, is that Apple is scaling down production of the current iPhone in preparation for a 3G version. AT&T, Apple's exclusive carrier for the iPhone in the U.S., announced it is building out its 3G network to more locations around the country.

Mac Production Up

Meanwhile, Banc of America said its checks of Asian production facilities indicate that production is going up for Macs, down for iPods, and the iPhone situation is volatile.
For MacBooks and iMacs, production has moved up more than 20 percent so far this quarter, Banc of America said, which indicates Apple is replenishing inventory and seeing solid demand. Banc of America predicts continued growth through March.
But Banc of America agrees with FBR that iPod production has been cut some 10 percent to 20 percent since January and 30 percent since December. Where the firm had been predicting 5 percent year-over-year growth, it now looks like Apple will see as much as a 10 percent decline in iPod sales.

iPhone Usage Is Global

After severe production cuts in December and early January, production is now up for iPhones. Banc of America expressed concern that production and demand for the innovative phone remain lackluster.
Meanwhile, Net Applications released new numbers on its operating-system statistics, which revealed that Macs accounted for the largest percentage of Internet traffic ever -- 7.57 percent. iPhone-based traffic nudged up from 0.12 percent in December to 0.13 percent in January. More importantly, Net Applications' numbers show that iPhone traffic is coming from many more countries than have official wireless carriers for the phones, indicating substantial gray-market sales.
"We've heard the rumours that many iPhones are being used outside the officially sanctioned countries. So we decided to check it out and surprise, surprise, it's true. The iPhone has a presence in almost every country on Earth," Net Applications wrote in its report.