-What's up?
Brian Tong here and welcome to the Apple Byte.
It's everything inside the world of Apple, so let's get to it.
Now, Apple's latest iPad Air is getting all the attention since, you know, it's Apple's latest new shiny toy.
So, we'll get to all the news around it, but we always like to look forward to what's coming from Apple and even if the new Mac Pro looks like an Ideaco Tubelor trash can, you can actually buy this online right now.
Primate
Labs has added again with their Geekbench 3 benchmarks and have estimated the new Mac Pro performance based on Apple's Mac Pro specification page.
Now, you can dig in deeper for yourself, but their estimations show that single-core performance will be similar for 4-, 6-, and 8-core models, but will be 15 percent slower for the 12-core model because of its lower Turbo Boost frequency.
Now, obviously, in multi-core performance, the 12-core model will perform the best with heavily-threaded applications that can take advantage of it.
This thing is really beast.
Then, Primate Labs also
matched up the new Mac Pros and how they're expected to perform compared to the last generation of Mac Pros with single-core performance being up to 50 and 75 percent faster in some cases and multi-core performance being up to 47 percent faster than current 12-core models.
The new Mac Pros are still expected in December, so we'll see how these results match up.
All right, onto iPad news.
And AT&T says iPad activations have more than tripled compared to last year's iPad launch.
The new iPad Mini is still not available yet and it doesn't mean Apple
sold three times the amount of iPads, but it's a good sign so far.
Now, also, a breakdown of the latest iPad Air from iSuppli reveals that Apple was able to move to Sharp's IGZO display technology shrinking down the backlight assembly of the Air using only 36 LEDs compared to 84 in the earlier generation and allowing for a sleeker and lighter tablet.
This is also allowed for a smaller battery while still getting similar battery life results.
Now, I'm loving the lighter feel and design of the iPad Air, and if you're still hunting to find out if an Apple Store
has the model you're looking for, it might be a little tougher.
That's after website Apple-Tracker.com was served a DMCA takedown notice by Apple.
Now, the site offered a more efficient way of checking product availability for all iPad Air models by color, capacity, and connectivity at the closest 20 Apple retail stores nearby.
Now, the big A Notice used jargon like, "You may not use a deep-link, page-scrape, robot, spider, or other automatic device, program, algorithm, or methodology,
blah, blah, blah.
But let's just keep it real, guys.
That's a bad Apple.
And there's still the bigger iPad rumor floating around after Chinese website PadNews reports that Foxconn is in the advanced stages of testing out a new large-format iPad that would sport a display of either 11.4 or 12.9 inches and could be targeted for a March 2014 release.
Really?
Giving credibility to the product name MaxiPad that the Apple Byte coined as far
back as 2009.
Now, on some other cool developments, Apple will be building a new 700-employee sapphire glass manufacturing plant for Apple components in Mesa, Arizona according to the State of Arizona which is also a home of the Grand Canyon National Park.
It leads the nation in copper production and petrified wood is the official state fossil.
I don't know if that's something to be proud of.
The big A continues to push its initiative for assembling and now manufacturing some of its products in the United States, and Apple already uses sapphire
glass to protect its cameras on iDevices and the Home button for the Touch ID-equipped iPhones.
Now, the connection that everyone wants to believe is the potential for it to supply parts for the rumored iWatch especially since sapphire is already used on high-end watches and could be more feasible on a smaller screen compared to an iPhone or iPad.
And this may not be the sexiest story out there, but Apple recently released a report called A Report on Government Information Requests after all the recent news about online surveillance conducted by the United States
National Security Agency.
Now, in the report, Apple says the vast majority of requests it gets are related to loss or stolen devices, but a small fraction of requests were related to personal information on iTunes, iCloud, or your Game Center account.
Now, Apple reiterated that their business does not depend on collecting personal data, which is true to a certain extent.
All right, guys, on the Quick Bytes, Apple is responding to complaints about the entire iWork suite after its recent facelift removed features that longtime iWork's users were used
to.
Apple says they'll be offering software updates over the next six months to address important things like customizing the toolbar across all apps and bringing back many other features, but Apple suggests using iWork's '09 that was previously installed in your machine.
Yikes.
Also, check out this new iPhone app called Knock that works in combination with a Mac app.
The app uses Bluetooth Low Energy to communicate, and when the two are near each other, just knock on your phone and it unlocks the Mac without having to enter in any password.
It's kind of gimmicky and kind of cool at the same time, so check it out.
The Knock app is 399.
And here's a clip from the Jimmy Kimmel Show worth watching, five-year-old boy genius, Arden Hayes, who can talk politics and world geography.
Again, this kid is five years old, also knows a little about tech.
-Hey, Guillermo, bring out the presents.
We have some presents for you.
-All right, guys, you're probably wondering what is going on here, but I'm gonna tell you the day after we shot the show, ABC took down that
clip and the reposted it without the any.
So, here's what happened.
The boy genius, he got a Sony Xperia tablet, but then gave it back to Jimmy and said he was gonna get an iPad for Christmas instead.
So, it makes me wonder, "Why would ABC take down that video?
Did Sony give him the tablet?" Back to you, Brian.
All right, before we go, you all know I'm a huge NBA fan and the season just kicked off, so call a gift from me and my friends at 2K Sports to you.
I'm
giving away two copies of NBA 2K14, one for the PS3 and one for the Xbox 360.
All you guys gotta do, and gals, is send me a picture of you rocking your best NBA gear, pose, do whatever it takes, and I'll pick and show off the winners next week.
Just e-mail me at the AppleByte@cnet.com or tweet me @BrianTong.
That's gonna do it for this week's show.
Thanks for watching.
We'll see you guys next time for another bite of the Apple.
