Month: May 2022

Introduced in 2005, the iPod nano saw different iterations throughout its life cycle. Now, one of the executives responsible for creating this iPod is showing some of the various mockups created to explore the possibilities of this product since he’s launching a new book called Build: An Unorthodox Guide to Making Things Worth Making.

Former Apple senior vice president of the iPod division Tony Fadell posted an image on his Twitter of six different iPod nano mock-ups. As he explained, they were just 3D printed dummies, “something to hold in your hand, but they’re what made the project real.”

The first mock-up for example was almost the design of the fourth-generation iPod nano released in 2008, while some of the others look similar to what the first-gen product looked like.

” What if your screen were this large? What if the wheel was that big? What if there was no wheel?”

One of the mock-ups, for example, is an all-screen iPod nano. It’s possible to say this is the iPhone without a notch, but it is interesting to see Apple trying out this design even though it was a mock-up.

The story behind the creation of the iPod nano is in a chapter of Fadell’s new book. The chapter entitled “Make the Intangible Tangible” is written by Fadell, an ex-Apple executive. He stated that the key to product development was making the intangible tangible, even though you aren’t building hardware .”

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Related:

• The final years of Jony Ive at Apple: relationship with Tim Cook, Apple Watch vision, and burnout to come

Apple is suing a stealth startup called Rivos for poaching engineers with access to secret company information. According to the complaint, Apple believes former employees stole proprietary information at the request of Rivos as part of the recruiting process.

While not much information is available about Rivos, it appears that the startup targets silicon engineers through job postings. Apple says the startup wants to design chips that will compete with their own, but the company believes Rivos is doing that with proprietary Apple information.

“Starting in June 2021, Rivos began a coordinated campaign to target Apple employees with access to Apple proprietary and trade secret information about Apple’s SoC designs,” Apple says in the complaint.

Ahead of the lawsuit, Apple wrote Rivos to clarify the confidentiality agreements that its employees had signed, but it didn’t respond.

Apple accuses outgoing employees poached by Rivos of stealing “gigabytes of sensitive SoC specifications and design files” in the lawsuit as well. The filing explains:

Some used multiple USB storage drives to offload material to personal devices, accessed Apple’s most proprietary specifications stored within collaboration applications, and used AirDrop to transfer files to personal devices. Some saved large presentations from Apple SoCs, both unreleased and Apple Proprietary, to their cloud storage drives. One even made a full Time Machine backup of his entire Apple device onto a personal external drive.

In its lawsuit against Rivos Apple named two former engineers from its chip team that joined Rivos last autumn. Apple is suing Rivos to recover trade secrets and protect them from further disclosure. The lawsuit also seeks to reveal the extent of the use made to reduce the damage that has occurred .”

Apple Watch Series 7 may seem like it offers minimal updates at first glance, but depending on what version you’re upgrading from, it can offer some big improvements. Read on for Apple Watch 7 vs Apple Watch 6 and earlier to help you decide which one to pick in 2022.

Since Apple Watch isn’t necessarily an every year upgrade for customers, we’ve included everything from Series 6 all the way down to Series 3 to give the best perspective on the differences between all the recent models.

While Apple Watch Series 8 is in the works, it likely won’t arrive until late 2022 alongside the iPhone 14.

Apple Watch 7 vs Apple Watch 6 and earlier

Processor and storage

Interestingly, it looks like Apple is using the same 64-bit dual-core processor in the Series 7 that launched in the Series 6. It is calling the SiP the “S7” but the processor is the same.

• Apple Watch Series 7 has the same processor as last year’s Apple Watch Series 6

While you shouldn’t expect a speed bump from Series 6 to 7, if you’re coming from an earlier Apple Watch model you almost certainly will notice a faster, more responsive watch.

Another benefit, if you’re coming from a Series 3 or 4 to 7, is a jump in storage to 32GB.

Case and display

Two of the main changes with the Apple Watch Series 7 are a slightly larger case at 45 and 41mm and a larger display. It’s 20% bigger than Series 4-6/SE and 50% larger than the Series 3 display.

And no worries on bands, all previous Apple Watch bands fit the Series 7.

Another consideration is you’ll be getting the always-on display if you’re coming from Series 3, 4, or the SE.

Battery and charging

Another improvement with Apple Watch 7 vs its predecessors is 33% faster charging. That means going from 0-80% in 45 instead of around 60 minutes for the other models.

If you’re interested in using Apple Watch Series 7 for sleep tracking, you also get 8 hours worth of use from an 8-minute charge.

However, no improvement to the overall battery life, it’s still the same, up to 18 hours.

Key features

Here’s a look at some of the core features you’re getting with Apple Watch Series 7 vs the previous models.

Price

Apple Watch Series 7 comes in with a starting price of $399, the same as Series 6. Apple Watch SE from $279 remains in the lineup, with Series 3 holding on for another season at the entry price of $199.

Apple Watch 7 vs Series 6 and earlier wrap-up

While Apple Watch Series 7 may feel more like Series 6S overall, if you’re thinking of upgrading from Series 3, 4, or SE, you get a larger than ever display, always-on screen, faster charging, and all of the available health features.

For more details, check out our guide on color comparisons, bands, and more.

• Apple Watch Series 7 FAQ: color comparisons, band compatibility
• Apple says Apple Watch Series 7 is compatible with all previous bands

Mayo Clinic has developed an algorithm to analyze data from Apple Watch electrocardiograms. The algorithm can detect weak heart pumps straight from EKG testing. It could detect potentially life-threatening conditions sooner than a physician.

Reported by STAT, this algorithm was presented at the Heart Rhythm Society conference in San Francisco. This study showed that weak heart pumps were detected in only a few patients. This test is part of a decentralized study including 125,000 Apple Watch EKG tests from participants across the US and 11 countries.

Cardiologists at the clinic believe the new results will “establish the early feasibility of embedding that capability in [Apple Watch].”

This demonstrates that you can design studies to explore the utility of single-lead (EKG) from devices like Apple Watch for clinical problems, and the researchers need to be commended for that. This should be viewed as a first step, but by no means is it ready for prime time.

Collin Stultz, cardiologist at Mass General Brigham in Boston

The study also utilized data from over 2,400 people who recently had EKGs. An app from the Mayo Clinic analyzes EKG tracings using the algorithm. Of the 16 patients said to have weak heart pumps, 13 of these were correct.

It helps detect heart problems early

While it is best to apply the algorithm to patients with a greater chance of developing heart disease, it is not clear who will benefit. However, the clinic is working on improving this. The clinic is currently undertaking a global study to evaluate various algorithms for heart function. The goal of the study is to identify heart disease early in patients so that they receive treatment before it gets worse.

According to the STAT article, a weak heart pump is treatable and affects about 3% of people globally. A weaker heart pump can lead to arrhythmias or heart disease.

If you’re a person who has high blood pressure and diabetes and you’re over 60, you may have a weak heart pump and not know it. You may not be going to your doctor too often, but a watch you buy at the store could tell you there’s an important signal that needs to be screened, so the implications of this are huge.

Paul Friedman, chair of Cardiovascular Medicine at Mayo Clinic and the leader of the study

More research is underway to ensure that the algorithm works with different individuals. It also aims to help high-risk patients seek better health outcomes early on.

9to5Mac’s Take

As more and more people purchase Apple Watches for health purposes, it seems about time additional benefits arrive. Although it will take time for the Apple Watch algorithm’s to become more efficient, it is encouraging to see some improvements. While these devices have saved lives before, they will probably save even more in the future.

After digging into Apple Silicon, researchers have discovered a new vulnerability that affects Apple’s latest M1 and A14 chips. Although the Augury Apple Silicon microarchitectural flaw was shown to allow data to be leaked at rest, it doesn’t seem to be that bad at all.

Jose Rodrigo Sanchez Vicarte at the University of Illinois at Urbana Champaign and Michael Flanders at the University of Washington led a group of researchers who published details on their discovery of the novel Augury microarchitectural Apple Silicon flaw (all details were shared with Apple prior to publishing).

The group discovered that Apple chips employ a Data-Memory Dependent Prefetcher, (DMP), which examines memory content in order to determine what prefetch to use.

How the Augury Apple Silicon vulnerability works

Specifically, Apple’s M1, M1 Max, and A14 were tested and found to prefetch with an array-of-pointers dereferencing pattern. The researchers discovered that process can leak data that is “never read by any instruction, even speculatively!” They also believe the M1 Pro and possibly older A-series chips are vulnerable to the same flaw.

Here’s how the researchers say Apple’s DMP is different from traditional ones:

Once the *arr[0] has been *arr [2] occurred (even speculationally! It will start prefetching from *arr [3]. That is, it will first prefetch ahead the contents of arr and then dereference those contents. In contrast, a conventional prefetcher would not perform the second step/dereference operation.

As for why data at rest attacks like this are troublesome, the paper says most hardware or software defensive strategies to prevent “microarchitectural attacks assume there is some instruction that accesses the secret.” But data at rest vulnerabilities don’t work that way. Further explanation is provided by the research: :

Any defense that depends on tracking which data was accessed by core (speculatively and non-speculatively), cannot protect against Augury. The core never has access to the leak data!

But David Kohlbrenner (Assistant Professor, University of Washington) and one of the advisors to the research team points out that this DMP is “about the weakest DMP an attack can get .”

The researchers highlight that sentiment in the paper saying this vulnerability isn’t “that bad” for now and they haven’t demonstrated any “end-to-end exploits with Augury techniques at this time. Only pointers are currently available, but they can only be leaked in the sandbox danger model .

9to5Mac’s take

This is a fascinating discovery. Fortunately, there aren’t many to be concerned about, as researchers consider it the weakest DMP attackers can use. But, Apple has made important discoveries that will allow them to improve security and prevent malicious usage.

In the year and a half since Apple went all-in on making its own chips, we’ve only seen a few security concerns specifically around the M1 pop-up. One saw apps exchange data covertly but that wasn’t a real issue and another was custom-made Apple Silicon malware (a perennial problem on any hardware).

The researchers are not aware of Apple working on a patch for Augury, but we’ll be keeping an eye out for any developments around this flaw.

As previously reported, Apple plans to pretty much ditch Qualcomm’s cellular modems for its proprietary 5G modem starting in 2023. The Wall Street Journal reported that Apple is still aiming to release a new model next year and giving away lots of clues.