Eric Slivka
Eric is the Editor-in-Chief of MacRumors and has been writing for the site since 2008.
An avid swimmer and former biophysicist, Eric has been using Apple products for over 35 years and has been interviewed for pieces by The Wall Street Journal, The New York Times, Reuters, BBC, CNBC, and other publications.
Eric's current primary role involves day-to-day oversight of the editorial operations at MacRumors, but he also contributes occasional news and review articles while handling various other duties related to the site's operation.
An avid swimmer and former biophysicist, Eric has been using Apple products for over 35 years and has been interviewed for pieces by The Wall Street Journal, The New York Times, Reuters, BBC, CNBC, and other publications.
Eric's current primary role involves day-to-day oversight of the editorial operations at MacRumors, but he also contributes occasional news and review articles while handling various other duties related to the site's operation.
Eric Slivka's Articles
App Store Launches in 32 New Countries
At Apple's Worldwide Developers Conference earlier this month, Tim Cook announced that the App Store would be launching in 32 additional countries this month, bringing the total number of countries with App Store access to 155. As documented in the country-selection page within the iTunes Store, those 32 new markets are now available, although Apple has yet to update its support page listing...
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Running the Retina MacBook Pro at Full 2880x1800 Resolution
While Apple's new Retina MacBook Pro includes a display measuring 2880x1800 pixels, the default display options do not allow users to run their systems at that raw resolution. Instead, the extra pixels are used to display a higher level of detail on a canvas representing the previous 1440x900 resolution. As a result, windows and user interface elements appear to be the same relative size as on...
Apple Launches Improved Employee Hardware Discount Program for Mac and iPad
Back in January, Apple CEO Tim Cook announced to employees that the company would begin a new hardware discount program in June, offering employees $500 off a Mac (excluding the Mac mini) or $250 off an iPad.
In line with that schedule, 9to5Mac reports that the new program has now gone live. As had been previously claimed, the discount is available to employees who have worked at Apple for at ...
Foxconn Accelerating Sharp LCD Panel Orders to Launch Apple Television for Holiday Season?
In a new research note published today, Topeka Capital Markets analyst Brian White points to a new report from Chinese business site 21cbh.com claiming that Foxconn/Hon Hai has accelerated its schedule for ordering television-sized LCD panels from Sharp, fueling speculation that the panels are destined for an Apple television set that could debut in time for the holiday shopping season this year. ...
Apple's Smaller iOS Device Dock Connector Said to Include 19 Pins
Back in February, iMore reported that Apple was working on a smaller dock connector for its iOS devices, seeking to shave the size of the current 30-pin connector in order to allow its devices to shrink further and to provide space for other components.
Rumors of the smaller dock connector have persisted in the months since, and with claimed rear shells for the next-generation iPhone showing a ...
Apple Retail Store Staff Set to Gain Raises of Up to 25%
Earlier this week, Business Insider reported that all Apple retail store staff would be receiving raises of at least $4 per hour, a claim that the site later backpedaled from somewhat as other sources from the company's stores reported in to note that they had heard nothing of the sort.
But Dow Jones Newswires is now weighing in with its own claims that Apple is indeed raising staff pay by...
Apple's iCloud and iMessage Services Experiencing Significant Outage [Update: Resolved]
A number of MacRumors readers are reporting that iCloud services are currently down, and based on the number of reports it appears that the outage is quite widespread. Apple's iCloud system status page is currently acknowledging access issues, although there is no estimate of the proportion of iCloud users being affected.
Beyond iCloud, Apple's iMessage service also appears to be down, with ...
Apple Announces 2012 Summer Filmmaking Camps for Kids
As it has done in some previous years, Apple is again offering free summer camps for kids at its retail stores, focusing on filmmaking using iMovie. Each session of the camp, which is targeted at children ages 8-12, includes two 90-minute weekday workshops where students will learn about filmmaking and then create their films in iMovie using footage shot themselves. The session concludes with...
Non-Retina Mid-2012 MacBook Pro Torn Apart
It's been a busy week of Apple teardowns for iFixit, with the firm announcing today that it has completed its work on the non-Retina version of the Mid-2012 MacBook Pro.
Given that the non-Retina version has retained the same form factor for a number of years, there are few changes to the internal layout of the components, but a fresh look inside now that the redesigned Retina MacBook Pro...
Apple Posts WWDC 2012 Session Videos for Developers
Just days after the conclusion of its 2012 Worldwide Developers Conference (WWDC) in San Francisco, Apple has posted the full set of session videos to its website and iTunes. Access to the videos requires a minimum of a free Registered Apple Developer account.
With over 100 sessions available, the videos are a significant resource for those looking to learn more about developing for OS X...
Apple Seeds OS X 10.7.5 Build 11G15 to Developers
Following yesterday's news that Apple was preparing to begin seeding versions of OS X 10.7.5 to developers, the first of those developer seeds has now been released. This first version arrives as Build 11G15 and asks testers to focus their efforts on the following areas:- Graphics performance and quality
- Image & Media importing, editing or viewing
- Networking reliability & performanceThe...
Carriers Quiet on Prospects for FaceTime Over Cellular Networks with iOS 6
As part of its iOS 6 preview at last week's Worldwide Developers Conference, Apple announced that it would officially be bringing its FaceTime video calling feature to cellular networks, significantly expanding the usability of the feature for users on the go.FaceTime now works over cellular networks as well as Wi-Fi, so you can make and receive FaceTime calls wherever you happen to be. You can...
FileMaker Releases Bento 4 for iPad
With the debut of the original iPad back in March 2010, Apple subsidiary FileMaker released an iPad version of Bento, the company's personal database software. But while the app has received a few updates since that time, major changes have been relatively few and far between even with the release of Bento 4 for Mac in March 2011.
That all changes today with the release of Bento 4 for iPad [Ap...
Teardown of New MacBook Pro's Retina Display Reveals 'Engineering Marvel'
Last week, the teardown experts at iFixit took a look at the new Retina MacBook Pro, noting how Apple used a number of innovations first deployed in the MacBook Air to reduce the machine's thickness but in the process hampered users' ability to repair and upgrade components.
As it notes on its blog, iFixit has now taken apart the Retina display itself to further examine the steps Apple took to ...
Apple and Liquidmetal Technologies Extend Intellectual Property Agreement Until 2014
In a Securities and Exchange Commission filing made today, Liquidmetal Technologies announced that it has extended its agreement with Apple to effectively license its ongoing intellectual property development for an additional two years.
The agreement, which is funneled through a subsidiary known as Crucible Intellectual Property, LLC, provides Apple with a full license to all of Liquidmetal's ...
Apple Preparing to Seed Developer Builds of OS X 10.7.5
With the public release of OS X 10.8 Mountain Lion coming next month, some have wondered whether the current OS X 10.7.4 will be the final maintenance update for OS X Lion. OS X 10.7.4 was released to the public in early May, and the timeline would be tight for releasing another update prior to the debut of Mountain Lion.
AppleInsider now reports that Apple is preparing to begin seeding...
Mozilla Working on 'Junior' Web Browser for iPad
Back in mid-2010, Mozilla released Firefox Home, an iOS app designed to sync users' Firefox histories, bookmarks, and open tabs from their desktops to their iOS devices. Several months later, Mozilla acknowledged that it had no plans to bring a full-fledged Firefox browser to iOS, due in part to "technical and logistical restrictions" that would make it difficult to create an acceptable user...
Benchmarks for New 13-Inch MacBook Pro Beat MacBook Air, Previous MacBook Pro by 10-15%
Last week, Primate Labs summarized its Geekbench 2 database results for Apple's new MacBook Air and 15-inch MacBook Pro models, but did not address the 13-inch MacBook Pro as not enough data had been collected at that time.
But over the past week more data has come in, and the firm now shares its results which show the new 13-inch models are yielding approximately 10-15% higher Geekbench 2...
Apple to Launch Standalone Podcast App with iOS 6
Earlier this week, AppAdvice noted that three categories of content had disappeared from the iTunes app in iOS 6: Podcasts, Audiobooks, and iTunes U. Apple launched a dedicated iTunes U app earlier this year, but the fate of the other content types in iOS 6 remained unclear.
AllThingsD now reports that Apple will also be launching a standalone app for podcasts in iOS 6, giving them greater...
iOS 6 Maps with 'Flyover' 3D Hacked to Run on iPhone 4
As we noted earlier this week as part of our roundup of device compatibility for various iOS 6 features, several of Apple's new mapping features including Flyover and turn-by-turn navigation are not officially supported on the iPhone 4, much less the iPhone 3GS.
But as reported by SlashGear, a member of Russian site iguides has posted videos [Google translation] showing the 3D maps and...
