Who’s amped up for the weekend?! iPhone 4S early adopters are now celebrating their seven-day anniversary with their new little friend and everyone is geared up for Monday’s debut of the Walter Isaacson authorized bio of Steve Jobs -- but those aren’t the only things making news today. Here’s a look at what’s new for this fine Friday, October 21, 2011.
With the U.S. launch a clear success for Apple and its trio of carriers here (not to mention in six other countries lucky enough to get it first), the iPhone 4S now marches off to 22 new countries abroad. According to 9to5Mac, preorders for the handset kicked off today in Austria, Belgium, Czech Republic, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, Hungary, Ireland, Italy, Latvia, Liechtenstein, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Mexico, Netherlands, Norway, Singapore, Slovakia, Slovenia, Spain, Sweden and Switzerland, where the locals there will actually get to hold them in their hands next Friday.
If you exchange hard drives with Windows users, you’ve no doubt discovered that Mac OS X can read from -- but cannot write to -- NTFS-formatted disks. That’s why Paragon Software offers their popular NTFS for Mac OS X, and today the company announced a new version 9.5 with complete OS X Lion compatibility. Best of all, the update is free for 9.0 owners and a mere $19.95 for everyone else (upgrades from older versions are also available). Paragon also shored up their Mac commitment with two other products, CampTune X, a free beta which changes volume sizes on dual-boot systems) and Virtualization Manager, a free app for migrating to a Mac OS X-based virtual machine.
AllThingsD is reporting that Verizon’s third-quarter financial results are out, and Big Red is actually trailing second-place AT&T when it comes to the iPhone, with only two million activations compared to Ma Bell’s 2.7 million. Verizon Wireless appears to be Android Country, with half of their 5.6 million smartphones sold coming from Google’s competing mobile OS. Wonder how those numbers will look in January when the iPhone 4S is factored in…?
Portal 2 gamers, Valve has just announced their second add-on for your favorite multi-platform game in the form of an easy to use in-game map editor “that will let users design, build and share their own single-player and co-op test chambers with the community, who will be able to view, play and vote on them with a simple click.” The only bad news is that the add-on is in development right now and “targeted for release early next year.”
There’s been a lot of talk lately about the Siri feature in iPhone 4S putting your personal data at risk, but iPad 2 users have a bit more to worry about, assuming they’re using Smart Covers. According to 9to5Mac, a password-protected iPad 2 running iOS 5 (and possibly iOS 4.3 as well) is vulnerable just by opening your Smart Cover and clicking Cancel at the bottom of the screen while your iPad 2 is locked. The workaround for now is to disable Smart Cover unlocking via Settings, but we’re guessing a fix will be on the way soon from Apple now that this is making the rounds.
When it comes to turn-by-turn navigation on the iPhone, TomTom is among the most respected companies. Today, they earn more brownie points by releasing version 1.9 of their popular iOS apps, which are now universal builds fully optimized for the iPad. Existing users can even transfer in-app purchases or subscriptions from their iPhone, and the update also features up-to-the-minute maps and an improved interface. On the bad news front, version 1.9 is the end of the road for iPhone 3G owners. TomTom U.S. & Canada is available from the App Store for $59.99, with other variations also available.
There have been persistent rumors that Apple may be launching a refresh of the MacBook Pro this month, but now that there’s only one Tuesday left in the month of October, it’s not looking likely. According to AppleInsider, potential MacBook Pro buyers may have to wait until November to wrap their arms around a spec-bumped slab of notebook goodness, but that’s assuming the delays at Taiwanese manufacturer Catcher Technology don’t hold things up. Turns out those unibody MacBook enclosures are causing a “strange odor” from the plant, so they were shut down earlier this month to get to the bottom of it. Could that be the reason the rumors are wrong this time around?
We’ll close up Friday’s edition with some eye candy: Namely the first Apple commercial to feature the wonder that is Siri, which is now live on the company’s YouTube page. Take it away, Siri!
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