After Pebble was acquired by Fitbit late last year, Pebble said that its hardware devices would continue to function as normal for at least another year, with any future support for its services heading into 2018 unclear. Today, Pebble founder Eric Migicovsky has revealed his next project, and it's a Kickstarter for a case aimed at the iPhone 7 and iPhone 7 Plus that also charges AirPods, called "PodCase" (via Engadget).
The Kickstarter page describes the case as a "slim case" for carrying and charging both the iPhone and AirPods, thanks to a 2500 mAh battery. That'll provide up to one full charge for the iPhone 7 (with a 1,960 mAh battery), although not quite enough for a full charge of the iPhone 7 Plus (with a 2,900 mAh battery). That's also equivalent to "up to 40 AirPod charges," according to the PodCase's crowdfunding page.
Keeping track of your AirPod charging case is a chore. It’s one more gadget to misplace, one more item to remember when you run out the door, and one more lump of plastic in your pocket. Drop it into your bag or purse and you might as well call search and rescue! Storing your AirPods with your phone seemed only natural to us.
Charging an extra device every night is a pain. No one likes a mess of cables on their night stand, and remembering to charge your AirPods during the day isn't a great solution either. You plug your phone in every night anyway--why not charge your AirPods and your iPhone together? That's exactly what PodCase does.
The case itself is charged through USB-C, so those with the newest MacBook models will be able to fuel up PodCase through their existing chargers. A design for the iPhone 8 is said to be coming soon, but the company is waiting for the September 12 Apple event to confirm the accessory's design.
PodCase will retail for $99, but early bird Kickstarter backers will be able to buy the accessory for $79. The PodCase team also includes Avegant co-founder Allan Evans and Pebble industrial designer Steve Johns. Check out the PodCase Kickstarter page here for more information on the accessory, including a video introduction by Migicovsky.
The Kickstarter's goal is $300,015 in 30 days, and the PodCase's shipping date is estimated for February 2018.
Streaming companies Spotify and Hulu today announced a new partnership that will allow eligible students to sign up for Spotify Premium for Students at its normal $4.99/month price tag, and gain access to Hulu's Limited Commercials plan at no extra charge. In Hulu's press release, the company said that the offer streamlines two popular services commonly used by busy students into a single subscription plan.
The bundle is available to all qualifying new and existing Spotify student subscribers, immediately offering access to both Spotify Premium's music streaming service and Hulu's basic Limited Commercial, TV-streaming package. Users will also continue to use Spotify and Hulu through each brands' respective apps.
“In bringing Spotify and Hulu together, we’re now able to offer students – both the millions already on Spotify Premium, and those who are new to Spotify – access to the world’s best music, TV and movie content in the simplest possible way,” said Alex Norstrom, Chief Premium Business Officer at Spotify. “We’re very excited to be partnering with Hulu – a like-minded company which is as focused as we are on delivering the very best in high quality streaming content.”
“We are proud to announce Spotify as our newest strategic partner – they’re an iconic brand in music streaming and a proven leader in reaching and engaging young consumers,” said Tim Connolly, SVP, Head of Distribution and Partnerships at Hulu. “By bundling our enormous catalogues of content together in a single, highly compelling offer, we’re making it easier for people to enjoy all of the TV and music they love, whenever and wherever they want.”
According to Hulu, "this is the first step" that each company is taking to bundle their services together, and in the future similar bundles will be targeted "at the broader market" beyond college students. Find out more information on user eligibility for Spotify's student membership right here.
Former software engineer Scotty Allen has posted his second video to YouTube this week, in which he decides to modify an iPhone 7 in order to add a functional 3.5mm headphone jack into the smartphone. On the Strange Parts website, Allen explained that he spent four months on the project, working in Shenzhen, China assembling the tools, going through 7 custom circuit boards designs, and 3 disassembled iPhones to finally arrive with a working unit.
Allen said that the hardest part of creating an iPhone 7 with a headphone jack centered on the electrical design and fitting the new parts inside of the smartphone. Upon the release of the iPhone 7, Apple said that the removal of the 3.5mm headphone jack was needed to make room for the internals of the new camera system -- as well as increasing water resistance -- but Allen found that "there was inexplicably a lot of extra room" near the lower left hand corner of the iPhone 7, where he added the component.
The modded iPhone 7 (above) compared to an iPhone 6s (below)
While Allen's feat is notable due to many iPhone users' ongoing complaints about losing the headphone jack on the newer iPhones, it isn't a practical solution for everyday users. Allen pointed out that he went through designing numerous circuit boards that were "more complex" than anything he's ever done, as well as spending money on "lots, and lots, and lots" of spare parts and advanced disassembly tools.
I’m pretty proud of the final implementation. I took apart an Apple lightning to headphone adapter, put that inside the phone, and hooked it up by man in the middling the lightning jack with a flexible PCB. The PCB has a switching chip that switches between connecting the headphone adapter to the phone by default, and then disconnecting it and connecting the lightning jack when something is plugged into it. I have a couple other timer chips that briefly disconnect everything from the phone when something is connected/disconnected to improve the reliability of the phone detecting when something is plugged/unplugged (otherwise it sometimes gets confused).
The full 30-minute video goes into detail of Allen's project, and he reveals the successful final product at the 30:00 minute mark. One downside is that the modded iPhone 7 can't listen to music and charge simultaneously, which Allen admitted would require a "pretty serious engineering effort."
Earlier in April, Allen built his own functional iPhone 6s entirely by finding spare parts in Huaqiangbei, China. His final homemade iPhone 6s was a like-new 16GB device with full functionality, including a working Touch ID Home button.
Allen ended his new video telling Apple that he "really wants to buy an iPhone with a headphone jack from you," hoping that Apple will return the 3.5mm headphone jack into an upcoming iPhone model sometime in the future. Apple is holding an iPhone reveal event in Cupertino next week on September 12, and all three new smartphones -- the iPhone 8, iPhone 7s, and iPhone 7s Plus -- are not expected to have a headphone jack, although Apple might continue to include a Lightning to headphone jack adapter in the box.
For more information about Allen's project, check out the Strange Parts website here.
T-Mobile was the carrier with the fastest mobile network in the United States during the first half of 2017, according to a new U.S. Market Report for Mobile Broadband shared this morning by Ookla.
The carrier scored a 23.17 using Ookla's new "Speed Score" metric that combines low-end, median, and top-end performance for both upload and download speeds. Ookla says this is a comprehensive metric combining all factors that "matter to a good network experience" into a single score.
Coming in after T-Mobile was Verizon, with a Speed Score of 21.13, while AT&T came in third with a score of 20.05 and Sprint brought up the rear with a score of 15.39.
According to Ookla, T-Mobile's "tightly-spaced cell site grid" and smaller subscriber base gave it an edge over Verizon and AT&T, both of whom are dealing with higher traffic loads since their unlimited plans were introduced last year.
While Verizon has managed to deliver "consistent and reliable performance" across its network despite the unlimited plans, the rollout of AT&T's unlimited plans resulted in a "notable drop in performance."
Sprint, unsurprisingly, had the slowest mobile network with a Speed Score of 15.39, despite improvements made over the course of the last year. From June of 2016 to June of 2017, Sprint LTE speeds improved by 23.7 percent, but the carrier still can't match the big three.
T-Mobile comes out on top for overall speeds and acceptable speeds at a national level and provides the fastest service in 40% of the largest cities in the U.S. Verizon Wireless has the fastest service in many of the cities we looked at and comes in first on acceptable speeds in the top 100 CMAs, but we suspect their use of depriortization on unlimited could be bringing down their overall performance.
AT&T falls near the bottom in consistency of acceptable speeds and also saw a spoke in low end speeds in Q2 2017. The slowest carrier, Sprint, struggles with consistently providing acceptable speeds but saw big gains in the first half of the year.
While the above chart information covers the United States as a whole, Ookla also compared mobile performance data in the 100 most populated Cellular Market Areas within the country. The rankings were the same, but T-Mobile and Verizon Wireless were nearly neck and neck. Across the board, users in populated cellular markets see higher speeds.
Mobile performance by carrier varies greatly from area to area, so while T-Mobile may have the best overall network speeds, AT&T or Verizon could have a significant edge depending on where a user is located. All four carriers are aggressively pursuing improved LTE speeds and network expansion through spectrum purchases, refarming legacy spectrum (like ending 3G networks), network densification, relay solutions, and other techniques.
Across all carriers in the United States, there was a 19.2 percent increase in average mobile download speeds between the first half of 2016 and the first half of 2017, with an average speed of 22.69 Mb/s.
Average mobile upload speeds didn't see quite as much improvement, coming in at 8.51 Mb/s for a four percent improvement year over year. When it comes to average mobile download speeds, the United States is ranked 44th in the world. That rank drops down to 65th for average mobile upload speed. In rural areas, performance can be significantly worse, with speeds that are 20.9 percent slower than the nation as a whole. Verizon (51.6%) and AT&T (27.3%) have far more coverage in rural areas than T-Mobile (11.5%) and Sprint (9.6%).
In addition to looking at network performance by carrier, Ookla also shared some data on LTE speeds across carriers on two popular devices: the iPhone 7 and the Galaxy S7. On T-Mobile and Sprint, broadband speeds were on average slightly faster for the Galaxy S7, with little difference on Verizon and AT&T networks.
Both the iPhone 7 and the S7 see higher mobile network speeds than other devices because they aggregate three component carriers to improve peak and average speeds. On T-Mobile, Samsung has an edge because the Galaxy S7 enables features like higher order modulation and 4-Layer MIMO.
Ookla's report is based on data gathered from its popular Speedtest Intelligence benchmark during the first half of 2017. More than 3 million unique devices performed more than 14 million user-initiated cellular network tests, giving the company a lot of data to work with to figure out trends during the year. For the S7 and iPhone 7 comparison tests, data from 250,278 iPhones was collected and compared to data from 134,742 Galaxy devices.
Additional test results covering minimum acceptable experience, the impact of unlimited data, fastest carriers by city, and more can be read in the full report.
Google this morning quietly updated its Backup and Sync client app with APFS support for Macs running the latest macOS High Sierra beta.
The change, first spotted by Piunikaweb, means users of Google Drive and Google Photos can now take advantage of the new Apple File System (APFS), which was introduced in High Sierra. APFS replaces HFS+ and unifies the file system across macOS, iOS, tvOS, and watchOS, meaning it's optimized for devices that use flash and solid-state storage.
Google's new Backup and Sync client app was broken by the OS change, and some High Sierra users resorted to moving their Google Drive to an external disk formatted to HFS+ to allow their files to sync again.
However, that step should no longer be necessary with Backup and Sync version 3.36. Users can take advantage of the new APFS support by either downloading the Google app anew or waiting for their client to auto-update sometime in the next week.
Google Backup and Sync for Google Photos and Google Drive is a free download for Mac.
Instagram is currently testing a new feature that allows users to share new Instagram Stories directly to their Facebook account. The feature, first reported by Mashable, appears to be Facebook's latest attempt to increase the visibility of Stories in its main app, essentially by getting users of its more visual-oriented Instagram network to double-post stories as Facebook Stories.
As part of the test, which is likely only a partial rollout for now, Instagram users see a new option to share their newly captured photos and videos as a Facebook Story as well as an Instagram Story, according to screenshots posted to Twitter.
The experiment appears to suggest that Facebook Stories, which the company launched in April, have failed to be a hit with the social media network's users. Like Snapchat and Instagram Stories before them, Facebook Stories let users post a picture or video onto their feed, which disappears 24 hours later.
Facing poor adoption of a feature that appears at the top of the news feed, Facebook initially tweaked the UI to look less bereft by showing ghost-like, grayed-out profile pictures of friends, regardless of whether they've ever posted a Facebook Story. But it looks like that hasn't had much effect either.
By contrast, Instagram Stories enjoy high engagement and are reportedly used by 250 million people daily. In fact, Instagram's success has allowed it to remain largely free of encroachment from its parent company until now, so Facebook's attempt to siphon off some of that success to its core app implies this could be a last-ditch attempt to save Facebook Stories before the feature's removed for good.
Google updated the Google Maps app for iOS on Wednesday and brought a useful measurement feature to iPhone and iPad that has been available on the Maps web interface for some time.
Maps apps are usually the first port of call for finding out how far away somewhere is and how long it will take to get there via car, public transport, or walking, but these directions rarely reveal the actual distance between points and places on the map "as the crow flies".
With Google's new "measure distance" feature on iOS, however, it's possible to calculate the actual geographical distance between two or more points on the map. For example, it's now possible to measure the mileage in a straight line between two cities.
To measure a distance between two or more points in Google Maps, touch and hold anywhere on the map to make a red pin appear, and tap the name of the place at the bottom of the screen.
Now scroll down and choose "Measure distance", and move the map so that the black circle (or crosshairs) is on the next point you want to add. Then simply tap the blue "Add point" button.
You can continue to add as many points as you want, and the cumulative distance in miles or kilometers will update accordingly in the bottom left. To remove the last point you added, tap the Undo arrow in the top right. And to clear all the points, tap the three dots at the top right and select Clear.
Logitech's recently released Circle 2 Wired home security camera is today gaining support for HomeKit, which will allow the device to interface with other HomeKit apps, send notifications, work with Siri voice commands, and be controlled through the dedicated Home app on iOS devices.
"HomeKit truly complements the simplicity of setting up and using Circle 2," said Vincent Borel, director of new ventures at Logitech. "We're focused on building experiences that let you easily and securely control your Circle 2 camera, while expanding its capabilities. Whether you're checking on the kids from another room with your iPad or looking for extra peace of mind while you're away, HomeKit makes Circle 2 work even smarter for you and your family."
The new Circle 2 Wired camera was introduced in June and began shipping out to customers in July, but Logitech had not yet implemented HomeKit support. The camera is designed to let you keep an eye on what's going on in your house while you're not there with features like high quality 180-degree video, cloud uploads, night vision, an adjustable ball joint, and various mounting solutions.
With HomeKit, the Circle 2's motion detection features can be used in scenes to do things like turn on HomeKit-connected lights in the house, and the camera stream itself can be viewed directly in the Home app. With an Apple TV or iPad set up as a Home hub, HomeKit connectivity is also available when you're away from home.
Logitech also offers a wire-free version of the Circle 2, but that product is not compatible with HomeKit because HomeKit requires always-on connectivity to work with camera accessories. HomeKit works with the Circle 2 Wired camera by itself and when the camera is attached to either the Plug Mount or Window Mount.
HomeKit connectivity is available starting today. Existing Circle 2 users will need to follow the instructions on the Logitech website to enable HomeKit support.
The Logitech Circle 2 is available from the Logitech website for $179.99. It will also be coming to Apple Stores and the Apple online store in October.
As Apple's original Apple Music deals with record labels begin expiring, Apple has been pursuing lower streaming rates as it negotiates new deals. Apple recently reached a deal with Warner Music Group, reports Bloomberg, and the Cupertino company was indeed able to secure a lower rate.
Warner Music Group will provide Apple with a catalog that includes Ed Sheeran, the Red Hot Chili Peppers, Bruno Mars, and more, for iTunes, the online store, and Apple Music. Apple will be paying Warner Music Group a smaller percentage of sales from Apple Music subscribers than it did in its original deal. Apple is also close to a deal with Sony Music Entertainment, but is still negotiating with Universal Music Group.
Large technology companies and music rights holders are establishing a framework this year for how to share proceeds from on-demand streaming, now the dominant source of sales for the record business in the U.S. Music rights holders are willing to accept a slightly smaller share of the sales from on-demand services, provided those services continue to sign up paying subscribers at a high rate.
Apple began aiming for a lower rate after Spotify was able to secure a rate reduction. Since 2015, Apple has been paying labels 58 percent of revenue from Apple Music subscribers, while Spotify was paying 52 percent. Apple is now said to be considering providing labels with a 55 percent cut, with that number decreasing should Apple meet certain subscriber number targets.
Since its debut in June of 2015, Apple Music has seen steady growth, undoubtedly giving the company an upper hand when negotiating new deals with labels. As of June 2017, Apple Music had 27 million paying subscribers.
For the past five years, Apple's September iPhone-centric events have followed the same general formula. An event during the first week or two of the month, pre-orders shortly after, and then an official launch date approximately 10 days later. Apple's September schedule for 2012 to 2016 is below:
If Apple plans to follow this same formula -- and it looks like that's what's happening -- pre-orders for the new "iPhone 8" and its companion devices the iPhone 7s and the iPhone 7s Plus will take place on Friday, September 15 at 12:00 a.m. Pacific Time.
Following pre-orders, the new devices will most likely see an official launch on Friday, September 22, with pre-order shipments going out to customers and in-store stock available.
Friday, September 15 is a highly logical guess as to when we're going to see pre-orders, and unsurprisingly, that's the date being cited today by German site Macerkopf. According to the site, German carriers are preparing for a September 15 pre-order date and a September 22 launch date.
While Apple tends to follow a specific September formula, there have been deviations. In 2013, for example, Apple did not accept pre-orders for the iPhone 5s due to supply constraints, and in 2015, pre-orders took place early on a Saturday morning. Still, September 15 and September 22 are the most likely dates for pre-orders and launch, respectively.
Apple will unveil the new iPhone 8 at an event set to be held on Tuesday, September 12 at 10:00 a.m. PT at its Apple Park campus. An iPhone 7s, 7s Plus, LTE Apple Watch, and 4K Apple TV will also make an appearance at the event.
For details on the new iPhone 8, which will feature a glass body, edge-to-edge display, facial recognition, and more, make sure to check out our full iPhone 8 roundup.
Four additional veteran executives from the television industry are joining Apple's video content team, according to a new report from Variety.
Former head of current programming at Sony Pictures Kim Rozenfeld is joining Apple as its future head of programming and lead executive on documentary series development. Apple has thus far purchased several music-related documentaries that have aired on Apple Music, including Kygo: Stole the Show and Can't Stop, Won't Stop: A Bad Boy Story.
Rozenfeld formerly worked with Zack Van Amburg and Jamie Erlicht, two Sony Pictures Television executives who joined Apple in June to lead Apple's video programming efforts. Erlicht and Amburg have produced popular shows like Breaking Bad, Better Call Saul, The Crown, and more.
Two additional former Sony employees are joining the video team as development executives. Both Max Aronson and Ali Woodruff also worked with Amburg and Erlicht and will report to the duo at Apple. Aronson previously served as VP of drama development at Sony Pictures Television, while Woodruff was the director of creative affairs.
Rita Cooper Lee, who formerly worked as the WGN America head of publicity is joining Apple to lead communications for the video content unit, and she will report directly to Tom Neumayr. Lee is the second employee to join Apple from WGN America. Former president and general manager of WGN America Matt Cherniss joined Apple earlier in August to help oversee the development of the video unit.
Apple is picking up a lot of talent in the video and television area as it experiments with original content as a way to promote its Apple Music service. The company has launched two shows so far, including Planet of the Apps, a series about app developers pitching ideas to investors, and Carpool Karaoke, a music-based show developed from the Carpool Karaoke segment on The Late Late Show with James Corden.
While Apple's first two shows have been reality shows, the company is said to have bigger content ambitions, with rumors suggesting Apple is pursing deals with A-list talent to create a roster of shows on par with Netflix and Amazon.
Apple today released a new update for Safari Technology Preview, the experimental browser Apple first introduced in March of 2016. Apple designed the Safari Technology Preview to test features that may be introduced into future release versions of Safari.
Safari Technology Preview release 39 includes fixes and improvements for Beacon API, Directory Upload, Fetch API, Input Events, JavaScript, WebAssembly, WebRTC, Web Inspector, and Media. With Safari 11 now available to developers through the macOS High Sierra beta, Apple is providing two versions of Safari Technology Preview, one for macOS Sierra users and one for those using macOS High Sierra.
Safari Technology Preview users might want to hold off on downloading Safari Technology Preview 39 as the new version appears to be crashing at launch and not working properly.
Apple's aim with Safari Technology Preview is to gather feedback from developers and users on its browser development process. Safari Technology Preview can run side-by-side with the existing Safari browser and while designed for developers, it does not require a developer account to download.
Update: The Safari Technology Preview 39 release has been pulled by Apple and is no longer available for download.
Apple today announced its Northbrook Court store in Northbrook, Illinois, a suburb of Chicago, is moving to a new location within the shopping mall this weekend. The grand opening is set for Saturday, September 9 at 10:00 a.m. local time.
Apple's original store at Northbrook Court
The new store will be located across the hall on the lower level, between H&M and Banana Republic, according to property management GGP.
The current store, between Sephora and Finish Line, originally opened in July 2005. Friday will likely be its final day of business in that location.
The new store should be around 10,000 square feet, which is nearly double the size of the current store, according to Northbrook Court's leasing plan.
The new store will also be based on Apple's latest retail design, which typically includes wide, open spaces with some combination of large glass doors, sequoia wood tables and shelves, large video screens for Today at Apple sessions, and light boxes spanning the length of the ceiling.
All new Apple Stores opened since September 2015 have been based on the new design language, including flagship-tier locations such as Apple Union Square in San Francisco and Apple World Trade Center in New York City. Apple has renovated over 40 existing stores to reflect the newer aesthetic.
For the past few weeks, Twitter has been testing a Night Mode option for its desktop site, and as of today, the new Night Mode feature is rolling out to all Twitter users.
Designed to turn the Twitter interface darker to make it easier to read tweets at night, Night Mode can be enabled by clicking on your profile photo and choosing the "Night Mode" option from the drop-down menu. Turning it off is as simple as clicking the Night Mode setting a second time.
With Night Mode enabled, the traditional light colored interface is made darker with a black overall background and a darker blue background for tweets. Because Night Mode is enabled manually, it will stay activated until it's turned off.
Night Mode has been available on iOS devices since August of 2016 through the main Twitter for iOS app.
Night Mode on the desktop is currently rolling out to Twitter users so you may not see the option under your profile right away.
Apple's Developer site has been down for a couple of hours now, and while it originally seemed like the outage was related to maintenance, a few reports trickling in from developers suggests there could potentially be another cause.
Several developers are reporting that all of their developer account addresses have been updated with an address in Russia, perhaps indicating some kind of breach or serious internal error. According to multiple developer reports, their accounts list a Russian address instead of their correct address.
It's not clear what's going on with the developer site at this time. We have reached out to Apple for more information and will update this post should any new information become available.
@apple developer account addresses are all showing an address in Russia...
— David Negron (@dave_negron) September 6, 2017
Back in 2013, Apple's Developer Center was breached by hackers and was taken offline for several days as Apple worked to fix the breach, rebuild the developer database, and implement better security practices. At that time, Apple said sensitive personal information was encrypted and inaccessible, but some developers' names, mailing addresses, and email addresses may have been leaked.
Update: The Apple Developer site is now back up. No reason has been provided for the outage or the appearance of Russian addresses on some accounts.
Update 2: In a statement provided to MacRumors and sent out to affected developers, Apple's Developer Program support staff says there was no security breach. Instead, there was a bug in the account management application that caused address information to be temporarily displayed incorrectly.
"Due to a bug in our account management application, your address information was temporarily displayed incorrectly in your account details on the Apple Developer website. The same incorrect address was displayed to all affected developers. The underlying code-level bug was quickly resolved and your address information now shows correctly. There was no security breach and at no time were the Apple Developer website, applications, or services compromised; nor were any of your Apple Developer membership details accessed by, shared with, or displayed to anyone."
Fueled by the popularity of Nest, thermostats remain one of the more popular categories of smart home devices. I recently took at look at Honeywell's Lyric Round thermostat with HomeKit support, and today I'm following up with Emerson's latest HomeKit model, the Sensi Touch.
Announced back in May and launched in June, the Sensi Touch offers a horizontal design with a color touchscreen taking up much of the front of the device. Aside from onscreen controls, the Sensi Touch can also be managed via app or through HomeKit, offering a number of options for controls.
Installation
I've had a bit of previous experience swapping out thermostats, so I was already familiar with what needed to be done, and all told it took me less than 30 minutes to remove my old thermostat and get the Sensi Touch installed. After making sure the circuit breakers for my heating and air conditioning system were turned off, I launched the Sensi app on my iPhone and it walked me through all of the steps to get up and running.
It's a great setup process, with easy to follow instructions that integrate with the iPhone's Camera app to take a photo of your existing thermostat wiring for reference, as well as a terminal picker that lets you tell the app exactly which wires your current system uses so that it can guide you in connecting the Sensi Touch.
As with most other thermostats, the Sensi Touch comes in two pieces, a rear plate that is screwed to the wall and contains the terminals for the wiring coming out of the wall, paired with a main body that snaps onto the rear plate for a clean look.
The Sensi Touch's rear plate is well designed, using small paddles under each terminal to secure the wires in their terminals. The paddles are big enough to press with your finger, yet the terminal array remains compact on the rear plate.
The rear plate also includes a handy light that can be operated by switch to help you see what you're doing while connecting the wires. Once the thermostat is fully operational, this light can also be used as a night light to backlight the entire thermostat, but allowing it to be used during setup even without the main body of the thermostat installed is a really nice touch.
The Sensi Touch rear plate includes a pair of screw holes for mounting, one each with play in the horizontal and vertical directions to allow some flexibility. A built-in bubble level makes it easy to ensure everything is lined up properly. Unfortunately, my troublesome thermostat wiring setup with a full junction box located in the wall caused a few problems for me, albeit in a slightly different way than with the Honeywell Lyric Round.
On the positive side, the holes in the Sensi Touch rear plate line up perfectly with the junction box holes, making it simple to mount the thermostat. But its slim profile means the entire thermostat isn't much larger than the junction box itself, and so a bit of rough drywall cutout around the box as well as a screw hole from my Lyric Round installation are visible even with the Sensi Touch fully installed. The screw hole is easy enough to patch, but cleaning up the ragged drywall along the top will be a bit more work.
Setup and App Controls
After the Sensi Touch is mounted to the wall and the circuit breakers are turned back on, the Sensi app continues to walk you through the setup process, allowing you to configure Wi-Fi and connect to HomeKit.
Once it's connected, you can use either the thermostat interface itself or the Sensi app to set up schedules based on time and day of the week, automatically changing temperature set points throughout the day to account for comfortable sleeping conditions, times when you're up and about, and times when you're away.
Setting up schedules on the thermostat
Oddly, schedules can only be set directly on the Sensi Touch if you turn off Wi-Fi on the thermostat, and as I unfortunately discovered, once you turn off Wi-Fi there's apparently no way to turn it back on and reconnect to the app without completely resetting the thermostat.
Display
While the Sensi Touch includes a color display, it retains a relatively monochromatic appearance to keep the look simple, opting for white text on various shades of either blue when in cooling mode or orange when in heating mode.
Home screen in heating mode
If you choose to manage schedules through the app, the functionality available through the thermostat is rather basic, primarily consisting of adjustments to the temperature setting and changing the fan and heating/cooling modes. Manually adjusting the temperature when a schedule is in effect will temporarily hold the new temperature until the next schedule change or for at least two hours.
Night light
Other options include preferences for the home screen such as whether to show indoor humidity and the time of day, as well as whether to use Fahrenheit or Celsius units. A separate page in the settings lets you turn on the backlight for use as a night light.
Sleep display while in heating mode
When you're not interacting with the thermostat, you have the option of showing a blank screen or a dimmed screen that shows only the current inside temperature, again on a blue background for cooling or an orange background for heating. It's a very bland look considering the large, color display, and I'd definitely prefer something a bit more interesting.
Sensi App
The app is pretty straightforward, offering a main screen that lets you manage multiple thermostats and then a summary screen for each thermostat that prominently displays the current temperature and humidity, as well as the weather for your location and the set point of the thermostat. Adjusting the set point is simple, requiring just a tap on arrows along the right side of the screen to raise or lower the temperature.
At the bottom of the main display are a pair of buttons, one that lets you change the mode among heating, cooling, automatic, or off, and the other that sets the fan to automatic or always-on. I wish those buttons were a little bigger as hit targets, but you're not going to need to use them very often, so it's not a big deal.
Additional tabs for each thermostat are accessible along the bottom of the screen. One is a Settings tab that primarily displays your setup information but also lets you adjust a few options such as whether temperatures are displayed in Fahrenheit or Celsius and whether the humidity and current time are displayed. More advanced settings include the ability to delay cooling on rapid cycles to prevent system damage, lock out control for the thermostat itself, customize an offset if the thermostat reads a different temperature than you expect, and change heating and cooling cycle rates.
The final tab is for Scheduling, which allows you to create or edit schedules based on time and day of the week and adjust temperatures based on activity in the home. A couple of advanced options let you create multiple schedules in case your needs vary from week to week and turn on an "Early Start" toggle that intelligently starts your heating or cooling early so that your home reaches your desired temperature right at the scheduled time.
The Sensi Touch also includes a beta geofencing feature, which will automatically set back the thermostat by three degrees once you're more than three miles from home in order to save energy. It's not as advanced as Honeywell's geofencing which lets you define a custom radius and customize the set point for when you're away, but at least it's something.
The Sensi Touch will send alerts in a variety of situations to let you know of problems with your heating and air conditioning system, such as if inside temperature reaches 99ºF or 45ºF, humidity exceeds 78 percent, or inside temperature goes up or down by 5ºF even though the system is trying to cool or heat. It would be nice if these thresholds were customizable, but at a minimum the 5º alert should cover most circumstances where your system has failed. It would also be nice if the app could send reminders to change your air filters.
HomeKit
As a HomeKit thermostat, the Sensi Touch works with the Home app on iOS to help you see all of your HomeKit-compatible smart home devices in one app. You can easily adjust the thermostat's temperature setting via the Home app or Siri, and you can incorporate it into scenes and triggers to integrate with other HomeKit accessories. For example, you can include the thermostat in a "Good night" scene that locks your front door, turns off lights, and adjusts the thermostat when you're heading for bed.
Beyond simple temperature and mode settings and automation through HomeKit, other settings must be adjusted either on the thermostat itself or through the Sensi app.
Wrap-up
Emerson's Sensi Touch is a nice addition to the HomeKit thermostat market. Its large color display is visually engaging when you're interacting with it, although I wish it took better advantage of the display even when you're simply glancing at it. The Sensi Touch's touchscreen controls are responsive and setup is extremely easy, with a great app that walks you through everything you need to do.
On the downside, I wish the geofencing features were a little more robust, as I appreciated the customizability offered by Honeywell. The Sensi Touch also lacks many of the learning features that are the hallmark of Nest's thermostats and which contribute significantly to energy savings. Finally, the inability to easily adjust schedules directly from the thermostat can be inconvenient.
At a list price of $200, the Sensi Touch is obviously much more expensive than a traditional thermostat, even digital ones that offer scheduling features, but it's competitive with other smart thermostats, particularly if you can find it cheaper such as through Amazon where we've occasionally seen it for as low as $159 through third-party sellers, but availability varies significantly and pricing is more typically in the $180–$200 range.
Note: Emerson provided the Sensi Touch to MacRumors free of charge for the purposes of this review. No other compensation was received. MacRumors is an affiliate partner with Amazon and may earn commissions on purchases made through links in this article.
Apple today seeded the tenth beta of iOS 11 to developers for testing purposes, just under one week after releasing the ninth beta and three months after introducing the new update at the Worldwide Developers Conference.
Registered developers can download the new iOS 11 beta from the Apple Developer Center or over-the-air once the proper configuration profile has been installed. A new beta has also been made available for Apple's public beta testing group.
iOS 11 brings several new design changes like a customizable Control Center and a new Lock screen that's been merged with the Notification Center. Peer-to-peer Apple Pay payments are coming in the Messages app, which is also gaining a new App Drawer, and there's a Do Not Disturb While Driving feature that's meant to help drivers stay focused on the road. Siri, Photos, the Camera app, and more are also gaining new features and refinements.
ARKit for developers will bring a range of new augmented reality apps and games to iOS devices, and a new Core ML SDK will let developers build smarter apps. iOS 11 is also the biggest update ever for the iPad, with a new Dock that introduces much improved multitasking, a Files app for better managing files, improved Apple Pencil support, a revamped App Switcher, and a system-wide drag and drop feature.
iOS 11 is available for both registered developers and public beta testers and will be released to the public in September alongside new iPhones. We are getting closer to the end of the beta testing process and should see a golden master release candidate soon.
Samsung is one of the only companies able to reliably mass produce OLED displays suitable for Apple's smartphone needs, giving Samsung a monopoly over OLED panel display and allowing the South Korean company to charge high prices.
In a new research note shared with investors this morning, KGI Securities analyst Ming-Chi Kuo says OLED iPhone panel supply is "controlled wholly by Samsung," with Samsung likely charging Apple $120 to $130 per OLED panel module, which is approximately $75 more than the 5.5-inch LCD module price of $45 to $55 for "Plus" sized iPhones.
The high price Apple is currently shelling out for OLED displays explain in part why we're hearing rumors suggesting pricing on the upcoming OLED-equipped "iPhone 8" could start at somewhere right around $1,000 for the entry-level model. Along with an OLED panel, it also uses 3D sensor camera components for facial recognition and many other advanced components that could also add a premium to the price.
OLED displays being provided by a single manufacturer may also explains some of the rumors we've heard about manufacturing difficulties and supply constraints. We're still expecting the new OLED iPhone to be available in limited quantities for several months after its launch.
Kuo says Apple urgently needs to find another company that can supply OLED displays, and Apple is making an effort to do so. Apple is said to be investing billions in LG's OLED smartphone production with the goal of eventually securing 45,000 panels per month for future iPhones starting in 2019.
Apple is also rumored to have purchased OLED display production machinery from a company in Taiwan to research OLED technology in order to cut down on its reliance on Samsung, and there have been rumors pointing towards a partnership with Japan Display.
Until Apple is able to diversify its OLED supply chain, it will be difficult for the company to secure enough inventory at a reasonable enough price to build a full iPhone lineup with OLED panels, which is its ultimate goal for 2018 or 2019. This year, Apple will introduce one OLED iPhone and two iPhones that use standard LCD panels.
Biggest design overhaul since iOS 7 with Liquid Glass, plus new Apple Intelligence features and improvements to Messages, Phone, Safari, Shortcuts, and more. Developer beta available now ahead of public beta in July.
Biggest design overhaul since iOS 7 with Liquid Glass, plus new Apple Intelligence features and improvements to Messages, Phone, Safari, Shortcuts, and more. Developer beta available now ahead of public beta in July.
Google this morning 
Apple today 
