iCloud

iPhone 5 mania lifts Apple stock to all-time high

Less than one month ago, shares of Apple plunged after the company's third-quarter earnings "disappointed" the bean counters on Wall Street. Less than a month later, shares of Apple are up more than 12 percent and are again trading at an all-time high. In fact, earlier today, Jefferies & Co. raised its price target from $800 to $900, as Apple's valuation now tops $600 billion.

If you want to understand why, cue up the 1960s' hit by The Happenings, "See You in September."

That's when the iPhone 5, the biggest, worst-kept secret in … Read more

iTunes vs. Amazon: What's the best video service on the iPad?

The future of TV, movies, and home entertainment feels like it's changing by the day, thanks to the impact of the digital revolution. Netflix is the top dog thanks to its $8 subscription streaming service, but your viewing choices are severely limited. For a la carte, pay-as-you-go services, Apple's iTunes has been the default choice for many when it comes to buying, renting, and viewing videos. Splitting the difference was Amazon's Instant Video: it offers a diverse library of pay-per-view TV shows and movies, plus a subset of "free" content for subscribers to the company'… Read more

iTunes movies in the Cloud expands across the world

Many iTunes Cloud users outside the U.S. can now watch their favorite synced movies on any computer or iDevice.

As of yesterday, such countries as the U.K., Canada, Australia, and New Zealand, along with several in Latin America and the Asia Pacific region, are now on Apple's list for cloud-based movie support. This means that movies purchased from iTunes are automatically synced to the cloud and made available for viewing on any eligible device -- computer, iPhone, iPad, iPod Touch, or Apple TV.

Entertainment available through iTunes in the Cloud includes music, videos, movies, TV shows, books, … Read more

Apple refreshes iCloud beta with new Web apps

Apple has apparently cooked up Web-based versions of its Notes and Reminders apps, as seen in the latest iCloud beta.

Accessible via iCloud from a PC or Mac, the new apps seem similar to their mobile iOS and Mountain Lion counterparts, according to a review by 9to5Mac.

The Web-based Notes app lets you enter and organize notes and then e-mail them using the iCloud e-mail. The Reminders app allows you to add reminders, attach notes to them, and schedule the date and time for you to be alerted.

Other online surprises are in store for iCloud users.

The latest beta … Read more

iWork.com users have one month before Apple shuts it down

In the wake of the closure of MobileMe, Apple is again reminding people that it is pulling the plug on iWork.com at the end of the month as it transitions users to its iCloud service for online syncing and storage.

"As of July 31, 2012, you will no longer be able to access your documents on the iWork.com site or view them on the Web," the iWork.com site says. "We recommend that you sign in to iWork.com before July 31, 2012, and download all your documents to your computer. For detailed instructions on … Read more

iCloud service restored after morning interruption

If you were trying to get into your iCloud this morning but couldn't, you weren't the only one.

Apple restored service to the online storage service shortly after 1 p.m. PT, following an interruption in service that started around 9 a.m. PT, according to a notice the company posted today.

"Users may have been unable to access iCloud services. Normal service has been restored," said the message posted at 1:06 p.m. PT. The post said "some" users were affected.

We've contacted Apple for more information and will update when … Read more

WWDC 2012 rumor scorecard: The hits and the misses

Another year, another WWDC keynote in the bag.

In case you missed it, Apple this week refreshed its notebook lineup, priced OS X Mountain Lion, and took the wraps off iOS 6, which will be released in the fall. There were other things, of course, but those three were the biggies.

Now that the dust has cleared, it's a good time to look back at the top rumors that made the rounds ahead of the event, and see how they panned out.

Hardware

Rumor: MacBooks with "Retina" displays The so-called Retina Display is a marketing term for … Read more

How iOS 6 changes the iPad

Every year, we engage in the same dance: Apple announces a new version of iOS, and we instantly start wondering how our devices will change as a result.

iOS announcements tend to work forward for phones (the new iPhone is expected this fall), but for iPads they work backward: the third-generation iPad with Retina Display came out in March.

A host of new iOS 6 features change some of what the iPhone can be. Will iOS 6 change the iPad, too? Yes, if you're thinking of heavily using Siri or own a 4G/3G third-gen iPad or iPad 2.… Read more

What iOS 6 tells us about the next iPhone

Apple's WWDC may not have resulted in an iPhone announcement, but it provided the next best thing: a detailed look at iOS 6.

It doesn't come out until the fall, and will only work on the iPhone 3GS and models after that, but a lot of iOS 6 features will be welcomed by any iPhone owner.

New versions of mobile software (be it iOS or Android) can often be as feature-packed and exciting as new phone models, and frequently kick a lot of new value down to older hardware.

The question is, can we look into the new features of iOS 6 to peer upstream at what Apple's next iPhone might be like? I'll try. Here are my best guesses.… Read more

Apple's WWDC keynote: What we didn't get

It seems like every Apple event comes with an increasingly large dose of sparkling hype, and plenty of supposedly imminent announcements end up not happening.

This year's Tim Cook keynote speech at WWDC had its share of big news, and plenty of excitement -- iOS 6, Retina Display MacBook Pros -- but here's what wasn't there.… Read more