Technology - Google News

The results of the first big iPhone 11 Pro speed test are definitely a surprise - BGR
watchOS 6.0.1 for Apple Watch brings watch face improvements, more - 9to5Mac
HP’s Spectre x360 13 seems like an improvement in almost every way - The Verge

The results of the first big iPhone 11 Pro speed test are definitely a surprise - BGR

Posted: 30 Sep 2019 07:12 AM PDT

Apple's new iPhone 11, iPhone 11 Pro, and iPhone 11 Pro Max were released earlier this month after months and months of rumors, many of which turned out to be wrong. It seems odd that iPhone leaks from well-known sources might be wrong, especially since we're so used to knowing everything there is to know about new iPhones long before Apple makes them official. With the iPhone 11 series, however, several key elements of the new design were portrayed totally inaccurately by top leakers. We thought that the iPhone 11, iPhone 11 Pro, and iPhone 11 Pro Max were going to end up being minor updates like the iPhone 7 series back in 2016, but that wasn't the case at all. Instead, we got a big update with a refreshed design, a massive camera upgrade, and plenty of nifty new features to enjoy.

The camera is clearly the star of the show on Apple's new iPhone 11 and iPhone 11 Pro phones. Big improvements to battery life are a close second, but no one was ready for just how impressive Apple's new dual- and triple-lens camera systems are on the iPhone 11 and iPhone 11 Pro. In fact, after a few years of being overtaken by rivals including Huawei and Google, many experts agree that the iPhone 11 Pro's triple-lens rear camera has allowed Apple to retake the mobile camera crown it lost a few years ago. Apple's new iPhones are about much more than just the new cameras though, as Apple executives explained on stage when they announced the new models.

One of the main things Apple spoke about during the unveiling of the iPhone 11 series what the performance improvements. The company said that its next-generation A13 Bionic processor gives this year's new iPhone models a hefty 20% boost in power compared to last year's iPhone XR and XS series, which were already the most powerful phones in the world. Are the iPhone 11, iPhone 11 Pro, and iPhone 11 Pro Max really making use of all that new power though?

EverythingApplePro is one of several YouTube channels that perform "real-world speed tests" on new smartphones when they're released. These tests aren't scientific at all, but they do generally give us a good idea of how various smartphones perform typical tasks. The tester launches a series of apps on one phone and then launches them again in the same order on a second phone to complete the "first lap." Then the same apps are relaunched in the same order on both phones for a "second lap" that determines how well each smartphone relaunches apps from memory.

We don't typically spoil the ending when we share these videos, but EverythingApplePro found that the iPhone XS from last year was actually faster than the new iPhone 11 Pro from 2019. The first lap was quite close, but the iPhone XS pulled ahead in the second lap by a wide margin. Does that mean last year's iPhone XS is faster or more powerful than this year's iPhone 11 Pro? Probably not.

The likely explanation here is a repeat of what we saw with iOS 11, where optimization issues with iOS 13 are actually slowing the iPhone 11 Pro down. EverythingApplePro bizarrely chose to perform the speed test with the iPhone 11 Pro running iOS 13, which we know to be buggy. In fact, it's so buggy that it was only out for a few days before Apple released iOS 13.1 to replace it. iOS 13.1 may address some of the RAM management issues that appear to plague iOS 13, so it'll be interesting to see this test run again with newer software. In the meantime, the speed test in question is embedded below.

[embedded content]

Image Source: Apple

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watchOS 6.0.1 for Apple Watch brings watch face improvements, more - 9to5Mac

Posted: 30 Sep 2019 10:10 AM PDT

Following the release of iOS 13.1.2, Apple today has also released watchOS 6.0.1 to the public. watchOS 6.0.1 includes performance and security improvements, according to Apple.

Ecobee HomeKit Thermostat

Apple says watchOS 6.0.1 also resolves an issue affecting the Mickey Mouse and Minnie Mouse watch faces, which lost their ability to speak following the release of watchOS 6.1.

It's unclear whether watchOS 6.0.1 solves the battery life issues that many Apple Watch users have been experiencing. Apple does say there are performance optimizations included in the update.

Here's the full changelog for watchOS 6.0.1:

watchOS 6.0.1 optimizes performance, provides security updates, and contains improvements and bug fixes, including:

Resolves an issue where the Mickey Mouse and Minnie Mouse watch face does not speak time

Addresses an issue where the calendar complication may not display events

Fixes a bug that could result in a loss of display calibration data

Apple is also currently beta testing watchOS 6.1, but it's unclear when that might be released to the public.

More on Apple software:

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HP’s Spectre x360 13 seems like an improvement in almost every way - The Verge

Posted: 30 Sep 2019 06:00 AM PDT

HP's Spectre x360 13 has undergone a fairly drastic makeover for 2019. It's still very much a Spectre: the premium 2-in-1 has glossy edges, a cleverly placed power button, and one USB-C port embedded into its two diagonally cut corners. But HP has cut away a lot of the excess from the old design, making its latest version smaller. Still, somehow, it feels bigger when you use it. And this model's trackpad ditches Synaptics trackpad drivers in favor of Windows Precision drivers, like HP's Envy lineup did earlier this year.

That effect is achieved in part by its significantly trimmed-down top and bottom bezels, giving it a 90 percent screen-to-body ratio. The top bezel is 5.8mm thick, seemingly too thin to fit a webcam. But HP has engineered the world's smallest Windows Hello-enabled IR webcam for that bezel. It's 2.2mm thick, and while that's impressive, I'm skeptical that such a small camera will yield good picture quality.

The chassis is 23mm shallower than last year's model, making it easier to tuck into your arm and carry around. It requires less space on your desk, and it'll fit a little easier on a train or airplane seat tray. Thankfully, that still leaves enough space for the same keyboard layout with a new, dedicated microphone mute key, though the trackpad is just a bit smaller.

You can opt for an OLED screen with 4K resolution this time around, which is borrowed from this year's HP Spectre x360 15. It looks just as crisp, and it's capable of deep, inky blacks and rich contrast. The event space where I saw the machine was flooded with natural light, and the screen was still easy to make out looking at it straight on and from multiple viewing angles.

HP's new Display Control feature is designed to help you get more accurate colors from the OLED. It lets you switch between color gamuts (DCI-P3, sRGB, and Adobe RGB), depending on the kind of content you're looking at. This feature can be adjusted; HP demonstrated this by comparing the color of a shirt with how it looked online using the different modes. If you purchased the shirt while looking at it via, say, movie (DCI-P3) mode, you'd probably be disappointed with the shirt's color when it arrived. But web mode (sRGB) was almost a perfect match.

The $1,099 baseline model of the Spectre x360 13 has a full HD LED screen, an Intel Core i5-1035G1 processor, 8GB of LPDDR4 RAM, and a 256GB SATA SSD. The high-end model built with an OLED screen features the Intel Core i7-1065G7 processor and 16GB of RAM. That model is available in two configurations, each costing $1,499: one with an anti-reflective screen and a 512GB NVMe SSD or a standard OLED screen with 1TB of NVMe SSD storage. A fourth option will be made available later in 2019 featuring HP's Sure View display tech that digitally limits the viewing angle to help you feel protected from onlookers. (The price isn't available yet.)

Every configuration of the Spectre x360 13 features Intel's 10th Gen Ice Lake quad-core processor and Iris Plus graphics. HP says that this is a Project Athena-certified laptop, which means it can last for up to 22 hours (depending on the type of screen your model has). The default FHD LED uses 1W of power, but the OLED — with and without HP's anti-reflective screen or with the Sure View tech — will use more.

There will be a few different configurations released in October: two are being built for sale at Best Buy, while HP will offer a few models through its site directly, starting at $1,099. It will also allow people to customize the laptop through HP.com.

My colleague Dan Seifert praised the previous version of the Spectre x360 13 for its great build quality and impressive performance. The new model is aimed at fixing a few of its low points, like making its bezels smaller, but we'll soon see how the rest of it holds up in our upcoming full review.

Update 12:20PM ET, Sept 30th: Updated to reflect that the new Spectre x360 13's trackpad uses Windows Precision drivers.

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