Originally published at: http://appletalk.com.au/2016/11/tuesday-morning-news221116/
Another day, another Apple repair program. This time around it’s for an unexpected shutdown issue that affects iPhone 6s devices, which Apple says does not represent a safety issue and only affects a limited range of serial numbers manufactured between September and October 2015. If your serial number is one of the affected devices, you’ll be able to have your battery swapped out free of charge.
Bloomberg is reporting Apple has disbanded its wireless router team, which means we probably won’t see a new AirPort Extreme or Express from the company for a little while. The news is being reported as a move to help Apple consolidate its terms to focus on products that generate the majority of its revenue, but maybe Apple just thinks wireless routers are now good enough — even if they aren’t as well designed as the AirPort.
A good, well-sourced technical explanation of why the MacBook Pro is limited to 16GB of RAM comes down to the type and speed of RAM that Apple are using. Apple’s Phil Schiller has commented via email on the article, saying that supporting 32GB of RAM would mean using DDR RAM and changing the logic board design, “both factors [which] would reduce battery life”.
9to5Mac says US residents get a special Apple Watch activity badge this Thanksgiving. The first-ever Activity Challenge requires users to run or walk 5KM on November 24th, using either Apple’s Workout app or any third-party one which integrates into Apple Health. In return for completing the Activity Challenge, users will gain a special achievement badge and a special iMessage sticker, but it remains to be seen whether we’ll see the activity challenge outside of the US.
There’s a hack for enabling unsupported Thunderbolt 3 devices on macOS, which lets you use any compatible Thunderbolt 3 device regardless of whether it has been certified for use with macOS or not. It’s not currently known why Apple decided to block some Thunderbolt 3 devices and not others, although there doesn’t appear to be any technical reason (as yet).
In case you missed it, Apple Pay now supports instant donations to charities and nonprofits.
Apple’s latest patent puts health-tracking capabilities in AirPods, or some other kind of wireless headphones. Temperature, heart rate, and perspiration levels are all capable of being monitored by the health-focused earbuds, although patents are just that until actual products are released, and even then, health-tracking earbuds aren’t exactly new.
Blink shell is billed as the pro terminal for iOS devices, but the real star of the show here is Mosh support alongside SSH. Instead of dropping SSH connections like many other mobile devices, Mosh is built for constant connectivity. It’s also open source.
The Verge says you can now run Doom on the MacBook Pro Touch Bar, although the version where just the HUD is displayed is a lot better. But even then, there’s a reason it’s called a heads-up display — who’s looking at their keyboard to check their health or ammo?
The latest Apple Music ad is Drake vs Bench Press, which goes something along the lines of Taylor vs Treadmill from earlier this year.