It has, by and large, been a pretty good past week or two for Apple, and with stocks rising thanks to high sales forecasts of the iPhone 5, Tim Cook and his team have plenty to feel positive about. Having said that, iOS 6 hasn't released to such critical acclaim, and although it offers quite a few minor improvements in many key areas, one of the most anticipated changes - the new Maps app - looks to have been a marked fail.
Whenever we get a new electronic device - particularly one as exciting as the iPhone 5 - our better judgment tells us always to at least heed some of the instructions, but rarely - in fact, hardly ever - does anybody look through any of the literature accompanying their purchase. Although we'll happily part with hundreds (or even thousands) of our hard-earned dollars in exchange for the gizmo, will we take an hour or two to read about important features, tips, and safe usage methods? No way! After all, we all know how to use an iPhone, right?
Although iOS 6 didn't exactly pack in a mind-blowing level of new features, quite a few significant alterations were made to what existed with the previous version. For example, the rather awful YouTube app was removed as a stock feature, but iOS users could grab a much-improved iteration over at the App Store, so everything in the garden was rosy.
Yesterday, Apple released the latest major update to iOS – iOS 6 – for the iPhone 3GS, 4 and 4S, new iPad and iPad 2, and iPod touch 4G. It comes with 200 new features – some game-changingly huge like the new Maps application – and other small ones like being able to send out tweets and Facebook updates from Notification Center.
iOS 6 has just been released to the public, and if you're just about to give the new firmware its first test on your iPhone, iPad or iPod touch, you may be wondering what some of the key new features are. On the face of it, the home screen looks essentially unchanged, but Apple has brought in many significant upgrades and enhancements to its iconic mobile operating system. We've compiled a detailed video running through these improvements, which you can check out after the jump.
All the talk and column inches are understandably being devoted to Apple's iPhone 5 right now. Always guaranteed to get attention, large hardware releases will have the pulse racing for many people, whether that be due to the urge to splash the cash, or the distinct feeling that Apple is holding something back.
There wasn't, perhaps, quite the palava last year when iOS 5 notched up an incredible number of betas before finally being released, but it's fair to say - as with any OS release - Apple has again found itself having to work tirelessly in order to ready iOS 6 for its scheduled drop date.
The release of a new major version of Apple's mobile operating system always brings with it a fair amount of uncertainty for those individuals who prefer their Apple mobile experience to have a jailbroken slant on it. Firmware point upgrades often represent minimal change and are often used by Apple as an attempt to close certain holes in the firmware that have been used by the jailbreak development teams to bypass their security in the previous iOS version. In most circumstances it generally doesn't take that long to produce and release a jailbreak for a mid-range firmware upgrade.
Whenever new iDevices emerge, an update to Apple's iTunes application is usually released around the same time, and today at the Yerba Buena in San Francisco, the Cupertino company has announced iTunes 10.7.
At their special media event, Apple today has announced the final availability iOS 6. Having first been given the once-over at WWDC '12, Apple has presented us with a full-on showcase of its brand-new mobile operating system, known as iOS 6. As well as the features we've already seen, there were other new and exciting implementations on show, and here, we take a moment to sum up some of the most exciting of them.
