MacRumors

Sony today announced its first CarPlay-supported in-car audio system, the XAV-AX100, which the company touts as offering "everything you need" for long car journeys, including smartphone connectivity, a high-quality sound system, and voice command features. Following Alpine, Kenwood, JVC, JBL, and Pioneer, Sony is the newest company to manufacture aftermarket CarPlay systems.

Thanks to the inclusion of CarPlay, Apple's in-car software platform, users with Sony's new system installed can access Apple Maps, Apple Music, make phone calls, send text messages, and control various functions with the help of Siri. The XAV-AX100 system is also compatible with Android's CarPlay alternative, Android Auto.

In its announcement, Sony focuses on its new system's sound quality, which it says can "overcome engine noise and reproduce clear sound at any volume with deep and punchy bass." Users can even expand the system with other external amplifiers to get a more customized listening experience in their vehicle.

High power sound comes full throttle with the XAV-AX100 in-car audio system. 55 watts x 4 Dynamic Reality Amp 2 and EXTRA BASS™ low boost circuitry overcome engine noise and reproduce clear sound at any volume level with deep and punchy bass.

The 10-band graphic equalizer gives an astonishing variety of sound, perfectly complementing EXTRA BASS™ for an enjoyable drive. 3-pre out connectivity allows system expandability to connect external amplifiers with a wide range of speaker connections, allowing sound enthusiasts to build their own bespoke system

Users will be able to purchase Sony's XAV-AX100 in-car audio system with included CarPlay support for $499.99 when it goes on the market sometime in late November. The company listed a full roster of the system's technical specifications in its press release.

The New York Times has announced that its curated news app, NYT Now [Direct Link], will officially shut down and no longer be available to download from the week of August 29. The app was originally announced in early 2014 as a way to provide readers with a cheaper alternative to the digital subscription service offered by the company, coming in at $8 per month, "roughly half the price of the least expensive digital subscription."

NYT Now was said to be an attempt by the New York Times to offset dips in revenue from its traditional printed newspaper circulation. The goal was to present a less expensive subscription model, with news focused and curated for each specific user, and attract people who might not otherwise subscribe due to the ease-of-access inherent in mobile apps. Unfortunately, "the app never quite took off," and NYT Now transitioned to a freemium model last year in an attempt to expand its audience.

Kinsey Wilson, the executive vice president for product and technology, said the decision to do away with NYT Now was driven in part by a shift in how the company thinks about broadening its audience. The Times, with the help of its audience development team, now looks more to third-party platforms like Facebook and Twitter to expand its reach among younger readers.

“That gave us a different ability to tap into younger audiences and to provide exposure to a much, much wider audience,” Mr. Wilson said.

The app was said to have peaked in May 2015 with 334,000 total unique users in one month but, in the last three months, it only managed to acquire 257,000 total unique users. Many of NYT Now's features will be folded into the company's main mobile app, NYTimes [Direct Link], "including morning and evening news briefings, bullet-point lists and a more conversational tone."

The editors of NYT Now have written a brief note about the app's shuttering, including the specific locations users can find its various features in other apps. For readers who keep the NYT Now app on their iOS or Android device, it will officially cease being updated in September.

Apps like Apple News, which offer users a wide breadth of news stories from an expansive list of various publishers, are also likely to contribute to a slight loss of subscribers for single-publisher apps. Apple News is even getting a feature in iOS 10 that will support paid subscription models from sites like The Wall Street Journal, curating premium content right alongside free stories from other publishers.

Apple's demand that overseas suppliers lower their quotes for iPhone 7 parts and components has been met with resistance from makers, according to Taiwanese website DigiTimes.

Apple is said to have asked downstream part and component suppliers, excluding TSMC and Largan Precision, to reduce their quotes for iPhone 7 devices by as much as 20 percent, even though order volumes for new phones are reportedly 30 percent lower than those placed a year earlier.

Apple is reportedly using the rising handset supply chain in China to force Taiwan-based companies to make their quotes more competitive. However, DigiTimes suggests Apple's policy of squeezing out profits from Taiwan suppliers "makes no sense" because "the quality of products rolled out by Taiwan- and China-based suppliers is standing at different levels".

Whether or not quality is an issue, major downstream suppliers including Advanced Semiconductor Engineering (ASE) and associated companies under the Foxconn Group have told Apple that they cannot accept orders without reasonable profits.

Apple reportedly chose to exclude TSMC and Largan from its demands because the company is finding it hard to find alternatives that offer foundry services or high-end camera modules, respectively.

Meanwhile, ASE has seen its business grow steadily in recent years and optimized its advanced packaging technology by expanding its client base through a merger agreement with fellow company Siliconware Precision Industries (SPIL).

Foxconn Group, for its part, has acquired Japan-based Sharp, which will reportedly keep its production facilities busy, meaning there's no inclination for the electronic manufacturing subcontractor to sacrifice its margins to work for Apple.

Apple accounted for a 17.2 percent share of the global smartphone market in terms of shipment volume, but took as high as 91 percent of the industry's profits in 2015, according to data compiled by Canaccord Genuity.

Apple is expected to reveal the iPhone 7 at an event on September 7, and open up pre-orders on September 9. The specific launch date remains ambiguous, with both September 16 and September 23 mooted as potential options.

Twitter has announced a new "Quality Filter" feature that enables users to filter notifications so that they only see "quality tweets" and mentions from people they follow.

The feature initially rolled out as a test and was created partly as a means to combat users' exposure to abusive trolls, but Twitter says the filter is now available to everyone.

"Last year we began testing a quality filter setting and we're now rolling out a feature for everyone. When turned on, the filter can improve the quality of Tweets you see by using a variety of signals, such as account origin and behavior," Twitter said in a blog post.

The filter works using an algorithm to distinguish between good and abusive mentions. Any duplicate tweets or automated content identified by the feature are also filtered out of feeds, so that users don't see them at all when browsing the social media service.

To turn the Quality Filter on or off in the iOS app, users can tap Notifications in the navigation bar, tap the Settings icon at the top left of the screen, and toggle the associated feature switch. A second option on the screen ensures users only see tweets from people they follow.

Just about two weeks after it was reported that R&B singer Frank Ocean's next album, "Boys Don't Cry," would be available exclusively on Apple music, the singer has released "Endless," a visual album exclusive to the service.

An Apple representative told Pitchfork that the 45-minute visual album features new songs from the artist. The rep added that fans should "keep an eye out this weekend for more from Frank." It's unclear when Ocean's "Boys Don't Cry" is expected to launch.

"Endless" and "Boys Don't Cry" are just two of the high-profile exclusives Apple Music has secured in the past year. Other content includes Drake's "Views," Taylor Swift's "1989 World Tour LIVE" and Katy Perry's latest single "Rise."

"Endless" can be watched on Apple Music now. [Direct Link]

Philips recently announced its first Bluetooth-connected Sonicare toothbrush aimed at adults, which interfaces with an iPhone to monitor brushing habits, offer brushing tips, and make sure you're brushing right.

Priced at $199, the Sonicare FlexCare Platinum Connected takes the well-known and popular FlexCare brush and introduces iPhone connectivity through a Sonicare app that tracks everything from how long you brush to where you brush to how hard you brush.

Design and Features

I've used Sonicare brushes for upwards of 10 years so I'm familiar with most of the brushes and brush heads, and the FlexCare is one step down from the top of the line brush, the DiamondClean (my day to day brush). To be honest, I'm disappointed that Philips added Bluetooth connectivity to the FlexCare instead of the DiamondClean because it doesn't have quite as many features (3 modes instead of 5) and the non-unibody design isn't as nice.

➜ Click here to read more...

Microsoft today announced the launch of its OneNote Import Tool for Mac, which is designed to allow Mac users to quickly and easily transfer all of their notes from note-taking app Evernote to Microsoft's own note-taking app, OneNote.

Transitioning from Evernote to OneNote is as simple as downloading the import tool, letting the app locate Evernote notebooks, signing into your Microsoft account, and hitting the import button. From there, all of your Evernote content is available in OneNote.

Microsoft's OneNote Import Tool is timely because Evernote recently made a policy change that has pushed users into seeking other note taking services. As of late June, customers who use a free Evernote basic account are only able to access their notes on a total of two devices. Accessing Evernote content on more than two devices now requires an Evernote subscription, priced at $3.99 per month or $34.99 per year.

OneNote requires notes to be stored using Microsoft's OneDrive cloud storage service (which comes with 5GB free storage) but there are no restrictions on accessing notes across multiple devices. OneNote also offers many of the same features that are available in Evernote and it can serve as an alternative to Apple's own Notes app.

OneNote lets you work the way you want. You can get your ideas down in a range of ways that include typing, inking, embedding videos, recording audio, or clipping web content. If you prefer to use paper and pen, you can even scan that content with OneNote to make it digital, searchable and available from your phone to your laptop. We've heard that many Evernote users rely heavily on their clipper. OneNote has a great clipper for all major browsers, available for free at OneNote.com/clipper.

Microsoft's new OneNote Import Tool can be downloaded from the OneNote website for free.

Sprint has announced a new plan called Unlimited Freedom that offers unlimited talk, text, and 4G LTE data for $60 per month. A second line can be added for $40 per month, while up to eight more lines can be added for an additional $30 per month each. The total cost for a family of four, for example, would be $160 per month, the same price as T-Mobile's new ONE plan for that many lines.

Unlimited Freedom automatically optimizes select content, limiting video streams to up to 480p resolution, gaming up to 2 Mbps, and music streams up to 500 kbps. The carrier did not specify if tethering is included, or if customers will be able to upgrade to unlimited HD video and music for an additional monthly charge. T-Mobile ONE offers unlimited HD video for an additional $25 per month.

Sprint also announced that its prepaid subsidiary Boost Mobile is launching a new Unlimited Unhook'd plan featuring unlimited talk, text, and 4G LTE data, with the same content optimizations, for $50 per month. Up to four additional lines can be added for $30 per month each. The new plans from both Sprint and Boost Mobile are available for new and existing customers starting tomorrow.

After years of planning, and testing phases over the last few months, Uber this month will begin allowing customers in Pittsburgh to summon self-driving cars from within its ride-hailing app. As noted by Bloomberg, "no automotive or technology company has yet achieved" the public launch of a self-driving service, passing rivals Google, Tesla, and Ford, who have so far only performed tests in the field.

Uber's new program isn't entirely "driverless," however, since the company is still placing trained engineers in the driver's seat, "as common sense and the law dictate," to oversee each trip and ensure the passenger's safety. There will also be a co-pilot in the front passenger seat to take notes while the test trips take place, and everything will get recorded by cameras inside and outside the vehicle "so that any glitches can be ironed out."

On the passenger side of things, once users hail the specially modified Volvo XC90 sport-utility vehicles, they'll see a tablet computer in the backseat that comes stacked with information to tell them that they're in an autonomous vehicle and educate them on exactly what's happening. Although unspecified, it appears that riders won't know they're being paired with a driverless car while in the Uber app, but the ride will be free of charge "for the time being."

According to Uber's engineering director Raffi Krikorian, "the goal is to wean us off of having drivers in the car, so we don’t want the public talking to our safety drivers." The company also thinks the new technology could greatly cut down on the cost of trips for riders, which it sees as a major opportunity. Still, there are hiccups in the system the company has to fix before all of this progress can happen.

On a recent weekday test drive, the safety drivers were still an essential part of the experience, as Uber’s autonomous car briefly turned un-autonomous, while crossing the Allegheny River. A chime sounded, a signal to the driver to take the wheel. A second ding a few seconds later indicated that the car was back under computer control. “Bridges are really hard,” Krikorian says. “And there are like 500 bridges in Pittsburgh.”

Uber’s cars haven’t had any fender benders since they began road-testing in Pittsburgh in May, but at some point something will go wrong, according to Krikorian. “We’re interacting with reality every day,” he says. “It’s coming.”

Apple itself was the source of multiple self-driving automobile rumors, beginning last year, but ultimately it's believed that the company's first foray into the vehicle industry most likely won't be autonomous, with further generations down the line more likely to include the technology. All the same, over the summer it was reported that Apple is taking a "two-prong approach" to the Apple Car, focusing more heavily on creating its own autonomous driving system rather than the hardware manufacturing of the vehicle itself.

You can read Bloomberg's full report on Uber's autonomous vehicle launch in Pittsburgh right here.