Essential Apple Podcast 57: Barely An Atom Out Of Place

Recorded 24th September 2017

What a year this is turning into! This week hurricane Maria battered the unfortunate Caribbean islanders (again), Mexico was hit by a massive earthquake (again) and two loony leaders with weird hairdos traded insults and nuclear threats (again)…

Meanwhile Mark is back from Budapest, and we are joined by the wonderful Bart Busschots of the Let’s Talk podcasts to mull over the Apple Watch 3 and the iPhone 8, to stare in awe and amazement at the power and speed of the A11 Bionic chip, and all the other stuff that caught our attention over the last few days…

On this week’s show:

APPLE

How we feel about the new stuff a few days in.
Simon – I know I mocked the name Bionic last week; but now I’m seeing why they chose it – the A11 really is to other chips like Steve Austin was to ordinary people!
- Apple’s New A11 Bionic Packs One Hell of a Wallop – Extreme Tech
- iPhone 8 Is World’s Fastest Phone (It’s Not Even Close) – Tom’s Guide
- And I quote “If you’re wondering how all this translates to real-world performance, we have more good news for iPhone 8 shoppers — and bad news for everyone else. To really put the A11 Bionic chip through its paces, we put the same 2-minute video, shot in 4K by a drone, on the iPhone 8, Galaxy Note 8 and Galaxy S8+, and then added the same transitions and effects before exporting and saving the video. The iPhone 8 finished this strenuous task in just 42 seconds, while the Note 8 took more than 3 minutes. The Galaxy S8+ took more than 4 minutes.”
- Mashable have a piece on the A11 Bionic Silicon Development Team: – Mashable
- And this piece is a good read about the hows and whys and what makes this new SOC such a beast – Apple Insider
Hackers are remotely locking Apple devices and demanding Bitcoin payments – International Business Times
- As is so often the case, weak passwords and log in reuse seems to be the cause…
Apple’s previous GPU maker Imagination Technologies has been sold – Business Insider UK
Apple blocking ads that follow users around web is ‘sabotage’, says industry – The Guardian

TECHNOLOGY

Hackers Compromised Free CCleaner Software, Avast’s Piriform Says – News 18
Qualcomm loses two key rulings in its patent royalty fight with Apple – Apple Insider

IN THE NEWS

British people are second only to China in how much they want the government to control the internet, according to this survey – Business Insider UK
- The sample size seems quite small and the question worded such that I am not surprised by the result, but that result doesn’t infer what the headline implies and I am not the only one saying so – The Guardian via Daring Fireball

WORTH A CHIRP

Emmo Solar Window Charger and Solar Sunflower Charger – £27.50 UK each
Ikea have a fair selection of wireless charging things including cases for Samsung and Apple phones that don’t have native Qi, charge plates, lamps with charging bases and more – Ikea
Riggad LED Lamp with Qi Charger – £49 UK
And for the cheapskates like me:
- Acrylic Ultra-Thin Short-Circuit Protection QI Wireless Charger Charging Pad – £3.99 UK from Amazon
- and an iPhone Qi charging receiver suitable for hiding in many cases – £7.99 UK from Amazon
- An iPhone 6/6S/7 and the equivalent Plus sizes wireless Qi charging case with a separate magnetically attachable battery pack – £19.99/£21.99 UK / $29.99 US Amazon

Nemo’s Hardware Store (47:02)

Twelve South Cable Snaps $19.99 US / £14.89 or £17.99 UK – Amazon
Solo Montauk Duffel Bag With Laptop and Tablet Protection – $119.99 USD on Amazon
Doesn’t seem to be available in the UK Amazon store.

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