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How to add AppleCare+ to your early iPhone 4S order
TUAW is getting lots of queries from those who pre-ordered their iPhone 4S but were not given the option for an AppleCare+ purchase at that time; most of them ordered their phones from their carrier, rather than directly from Apple. If you're unfamiliar with the extended support program, you may wonder why this is an issue. It's because of some wording on the Apple website. Apple's site states that "AppleCare+ must be purchased together with your new iPhone. To buy it, add it to your shopping cart during the checkout process when you purchase your new iPhone." A call to AppleCare confirms that the service is not intended for sales made directly from AT&T, Sprint, or Verizon. On the other hand, the Terms & Conditions document covering AppleCare+ simply says that the extended coverage must be purchased during the original one-year warranty covering the phone. Which is the real deal? TUAW did a bit of phoning around, to local retail stores, to AppleCare customer service and to sales support. They all agreed on their advice: If you want to buy AppleCare+ to cover a phone purchased from a carrier or one where you neglected to buy it when purchasing from Apple, just walk on in to an Apple retail store within 30 days of your purchase and ask for help from any sales person. You do not have to make a Genius Bar appointment. This is a one-time exception to the policy requiring simultaneous phone & AppleCare purchasing. The sales support representative we spoke with explained that many customers who ordered from Verizon, Sprint, and AT&T weren't aware that AppleCare+ isn't a product offered by those vendors. Because of that, Apple is waiving any restrictions for the initial launch. As for those who ordered from the online Apple Store and weren't offered AppleCare+, several representatives agreed that the launch was a bit "overwhelmed." If you'd like to take advantage of AppleCare+, which offers repair coverage and technical support for two years plus minimal accidental damage coverage (one supposes that Genius Bars will become far less lenient about extending courtesy repairs and replacements for these), simply head on in after purchase, once the initial fervor dies down. Accidental damage repairs will still incur a $49 charge for each incident, and you are limited to a maximum of two ADR incidents per device/policy. AppleCare+ costs $99 and is normally purchased along with the iPhone. You can also purchase standard AppleCare for iPhone at any time during a product's initial coverage for $79. AppleCare extends your iPhone coverage and support from the default coverage time to the full coverage time of two years from the purchase date of the phone. It does not restart the warranty clock to the date of the AppleCare+ purchase, so regardless of when you buy the coverage it will not extend past the second anniversary of your phone purchase. Direct number for Apple Care 800-275-2273 Apple Care Sales Support 800-676-2775 Thanks Kai C.
Daily Update for October 11, 2011
It's the TUAW Daily Update, your source for Apple news in a convenient audio format. You'll get all the top Apple stories of the day in three to five minutes for a quick review of what's happening in the Apple world. You can listen to today's Apple stories by clicking the inline player (requires Flash) or the non-Flash link below. To subscribe to the podcast for daily listening through iTunes, click here. No Flash? Click here to listen.
Geekbench scores benchmark iPhone 4S A5 at 800MHz
Here is some good news and bad news for prospective iPhone 4S owners. The bad news is that the iPhone 4S has a dual-core 1GHz CPU, but its clocked to 800 Mhz. The good news is that, even with slower clock speeds, the 4S still beats the pants off the iPhone 4 and other Android smartphones. This information comes from AnandTech which compared the iPhone 4S and other handsets using online benchmarks. The results place the iPhone 4S at the top of the mobile phone market with benchmark scores well above the iPhone 4 and other smartphone competitors like the Samsung Galaxy S2. The only comparable device is the 8.9-inch Samsung Galaxy Tab which benchmarks very closely to the iPhone 4S. Within the iOS family, the iPhone 4S CPU and GPU benchmarks are about 75% faster than the iPhone 4 and slightly slower than the iPad 2. These results are not surprising as the iPad 2 has the same A5 processor as the iPhone 4S, but it is clocked to the full 1GHz, not 800 MHz. [AppleInsider]
Sam's Club now taking iPhone 4S reservations
If you haven't pre-ordered an iPhone 4S and really want one at launch, then you should check out Sam's Club before you start staking out your place in line. Starting today at 10:00 a.m. local time, customers can travel to the discount retailer and reserve an iPhone 4S on a first come, first service basis. All reserved iPhones will be available for pickup starting on October 14th. All you will need is a Sam's Club membership, your iTunes account information and any pertinent carrier information necessary to setup your new iPhone. The promotion doesn't say how many phones will be made available, but customers should expect the numbers to be limited as the iPhone 4S is flying off the virtual shelves. Early estimates suggest that Apple sold over one million handsets in one 24-hour period right after the pre-orders went live. [Via MacRumors]
Some German customers receive iPhone 4S handsets early
At least one iPhone 4S slipped through the hands of Apple and landed in the hands of a German customer a few days before the October 14th date. The lucky user promptly unboxed it and fired up Siri. You can check out the photos at Macerkopf.de. US customers are still sitting on the sidelines waiting for their shipments to make it from the warehouse to their front door. Most Sprint customers have received shipping notices, while other carriers are still in limbo waiting for their handset to start moving. If you ordered the iPhone 4S early on the first day, you should rest easy as you will avoid all the lines and have the phone in your hand by the end of the day. [Via Macstories]
Benchmarks clock iPhone 4S' A5 CPU at 800MHz, show major GPU upgrade over iPhone 4
Pre-orders for the iPhone 4S only began shipping this week, but a handful of early owners have already taken Apple's first A5-based smartphone for a test run, and they've got the benchmarks to prove it. The results, obtained by AnandTech, are hardly what we'd call shocking. In terms of Javascript performance (pictured above), the 4S measures up rather nicely against the Tegra 2-based Honeycomb competition, while out-dueling the iPhone 4 in overall CPU muscle. Geekbench results, meanwhile, clock the 4S at around 800MHz, with a score of 623. That's about 25 percent lower than the A5-based iPad 2, but notably higher than the iPhone 4 (see graphic, after the break). When it comes to GPU performance, GLBenchmark 2.1 tests in 1280 x 720, off-screen render mode place Apple's new handset well above the Galaxy S II, with scores of 122.7 and 67.1, respectively. It still trails the iPad 2, not surprisingly, but the 4S' scores show a major advantage over the iPhone 4, which registered a score of 15.3. For more statistics and graphics, check out the source link below.
iPhone 4S 8-Megapixel photo looks incredible
Click image for full-resolution download iPhone-toting photographers like myself are drooling at the thought of the 8-Megapixel camera and five-element f/2.4 lens built into the iPhone 4S. We've seen photos from Apple already, but now the devious minds at AppVV.com (who apparently have their hands on an iPhone 4S) have taken a photo with the iPhone 4S camera to show us just how good the resolution is. The image has dimensions of 3264 x 2448 pixels, larger (of course) than the iPhone 4's photo size of 2592 x 1936 pixels. While iPhone 4 photos quite often appear grainy at full resolution, the iPhone 4S image seen here is remarkably sharp. I can't wait to start seeing some of the photographs that will be taken with the new camera later this week.
Daily Update for October 10, 2011
It's the TUAW Daily Update, your source for Apple news in a convenient audio format. You'll get all the top Apple stories of the day in three to five minutes for a quick review of what's happening in the Apple world. You can listen to today's Apple stories by clicking the inline player (requires Flash) or the non-Flash link below. To subscribe to the podcast for daily listening through iTunes, click here. No Flash? Click here to listen.
Video reportedly shows Siri in action, settings, and benchmarks
Just as the sun always rises in the morning, every time a new iPhone is about to come out, somebody gets one just before the official launch and ruins the fun for the rest of us. In this case, a video from AppVV.com appears to show an iPhone 4S running some benchmarks and also demonstrates how to change Siri settings. In the video, the phantom user opens Settings and demonstrates the Siri settings interface, turning the feature on and off, changing language settings, and more. What's even more fascinating is that the user runs the BrowserMark benchmark, and shows a score of 89567. Running BrowserMark on an iPhone 4 with iOS 5 showed a result of 52433, so Safari on the iPhone 4S is about 70% faster than on the iPhone 4. Some TUAW readers are reporting that they're receiving early ship notices for delivery on the 14th. How about you? Tell us in the comments.
iPhone 4S pre-orders are in the mail
If you were one of the impatient million who jumped to pre-order an iPhone 4S, well, chances are your fancy new handset is already in the mail. A number of tipsters have reached out to us to share their shipment notification emails that just came in from Apple. All the packages we've seen are scheduled for delivery on October 14th, but we wouldn't be shocked if a few of those landed in customers hands a bit early. If you haven't already handed over your billing info, you'll be waiting at least a week or two longer. But, if you weren't camped out at your computer waiting for the 3am sale to begin, we're gonna assume you're not terribly concerned. [Thanks to everyone who sent this in]
Customers begin to receive iPhone 4S shipment notices
The excitement surrounding the iPhone 4S continues to build now that pre-order customers are receiving shipping notices. Customers, particularly those on Sprint, are receiving shipping confirmation notices from UPS that their packages are being processed. Most packages are being shipped 2nd day air, but don't expect your iPhone 4S to arrive earlier than the 14th. In the past, UPS's policy was to hold Apple shipments at the local warehouse until the set delivery date (though a few may slip through). Even if you beg and plead for the packages at the warehouse, UPS will not release them until the designated time. It'll be a long week of waiting and checking on UPS status updates for those with pre-ordered iPhone 4S handsets, but you should be able to rest easy knowing that you don't have to camp out
iPhone 4S pre-orders top 1 million in 24 hours
Apple has reported that iPhone 4S pre-orders topped one million units in a single day, breaking the previous single-day record held by the iPhone 4 (600,000). In fact, it was Apple's most successful first-day pre-order ever. Apple's Phil Schiller said in a press release, "We are blown away with the incredible customer response to iPhone 4S." The iPhone 4S will be available for sale on October 14 in more than 22 countries, including Austria, Belgium, Czech Republic, Denmark, Estonia, and Finland. The iPhone 4S generated more opening day pre-orders than any other Apple product. Sure sounds like a "dud," eh, CNN?
Apple iPhone 4S pre-orders exceed one million in first 24 hours (updated)
Last year's iPhone 4 launch brought more than 600,000 pre-orders within the first 24 hours. This year, that number nearly doubled, topping one million within one day of the device's pre-order availability through AT&T, Sprint and Verizon. Those that haven't pre-ordered the iPhone 4S can line up at Apple stores beginning at 8 a.m. on October 14th, or you can try your luck at pre-ordering now, though you may need to wait an extra week or two to get your hands on Apple's new iOS smartphone. Jump past the break for Apple's PR. Update: Maybe not a huge surprise considering the numbers Apple announced earlier today, but Sprint has just let us know that it has sold out of the 16GB iPhone 4S in both black and white for pre-orders, and that it's not taking backorders. 32GB and 64GB models are still available in both colors, however, as is the 8GB iPhone 4.
Switched On: The four Ses of the iPhone 4S
Each week Ross Rubin contributes Switched On, a column about consumer technology. The most surprising thing about the iPhone 4S is that people were surprised by the iPhone 4S, for there is ample precedent to the company both confining upgrades largely to a speed bump and to saying no to a host of potential new features. As to the former, the iPhone 4S is straight out of the playbook of Apple's successful upgrade of the Apple 3G to the 3GS, although the competition wasn't as strong as it is today. Similarly, when Apple first lowered the price of the iPod touch below $200 in 2009 amidst widespread speculation that it would add a front-facing camera for FaceTime (which it did in the next generation), the company noted that it didn't think the product needed any more "stuff." So, what, then, defines the iPhone 4S? The differentiators can be thought of as four "Ses."
Talkcast tonight, 10pm ET/7pm PT: Somber Edition
It's Sunday, and like most every Sunday, we will be getting together for the Talkcast tonight at 10PM Eastern, 7PM Pacific time. This week's will be unpredictable since we have happy news to discuss, as well as less happy news. We have some guests joining us tonight as well, and we'd love to hear your memories of Steve. Prepare for some laughter and (at least on my part) probably some audible sadness as well. Your calls and questions help us make the show the best it can be, otherwise I'm just talking to myself! To participate on TalkShoe, you can use the browser-only client, the embedded Facebook app, or download the classic TalkShoe Pro Java client; however, for maximum fun, you should call in. For the web UI, just click the Talkshoe Web button on our profile page at 4 HI/7 PDT/10 pm EDT Sunday. To call in on regular phone or VoIP lines (yay for free cellphone weekend minutes!): dial (724) 444-7444 and enter our talkcast ID, 45077 -- during the call, you can request to talk by keying in *8. If you've got a headset or microphone handy on your Mac, you can connect via the free Gizmo, X-Lite, or Blink SIP clients; basic instructions are here. Talk to you tonight!
Sprint says no to iPhone insurance, AppleCare+ breathes sigh of relief
The Now Network is apparently voting thumbs-down to the idea of having its Total Equipment Protection plans available to its new crown jewel. According to a leaked slide courtesy of SprintFeed, your shiny Sprint-branded iPhone 4S (or 4) won't be offered with a healthy portion of peace of mind; rather, you'll need to purchase the AppleCare+ Protection Plan or go through a third party to have any protection from accidental damage. This may change down the road, as the slide says it won't be offered "at launch," but only time will tell. Unfortunate, yes, but we suppose there's always a bright side -- at least there's now a Sprint iPhone to not have insurance for, right?
Why Siri should (and probably will) come to iPad 2
Since the iPhone 4S features the same A5 processor as the iPad 2, owners of Apple's current-gen tablet have wondered if it's possible that Siri, Apple's new voice assistant, might be offered on the iPad 2. While my colleague Erica Sadun's answer to that is "Don't hold your breath," I only agree with her up to a point: I don't think there are any technical hurdles whatsoever to running Siri on an iPad 2, and the fact that the device doesn't currently feature voice controls is meaningless. I think Siri will come to the iPad 2 eventually -- certainly not right away, but possibly within the next six months. Voice Control as it now exists on the iPhone 3GS and iPhone 4 doesn't function on the iPad or iPad 2, but there's a reason for that: the existing commands would be essentially useless on those devices. The pre-Siri version of Voice Control allows you to use voice commands to control music playback, dial phone numbers or initiate FaceTime calls, and ask the device for information about the current time or currently playing song. That's about all Voice Control does. Those functions are all useful features on a device that spends much of its time in your pocket, but on an iPad they make very little sense. On the other hand, Siri's commands would be immensely useful on the iPad. The same things Apple showed off at the "Let's talk iPhone" event, like setting up Reminders and Calendar events or looking up information on Wikipedia or Wolfram Alpha, would be very handy to have -- so handy that I don't see why Apple wouldn't offer them. Apple has long been a company that designs products its own workers want to use, and it's hard to imagine that no one in Cupertino has thought about how Siri could vastly expand the power and capability of the iPad 2. Since the iPad 2 has both a microphone and the same A5 as the iPhone 4S, there shouldn't be any technical reason why Siri wouldn't function well on that device. Some have speculated that the iPhone 4S has 1 GB of RAM to the iPad 2's 512 MB (a claim that will have to wait for an iFixit teardown before it can be proven or disproven), but my TUAW colleagues don't believe that Siri's functions should be so RAM-intensive that they require such massive amounts of memory. In fact, we've done some digging into Siri and found that most of the actual work of understanding voice commands gets offloaded to external servers. In essence, the iPhone 4S and its built-in processing functions determine what you said, while Apple's servers translate that into what you meant and send that information back to your iPhone. The pre-processing that takes place on the device itself may be too taxing for an A4 processor, but the iPad 2's A5 should theoretically be able to handle it just fine. Perhaps even better -- Apple has a habit of underclocking CPUs for the iPhone in the interest of power management, so the iPad 2's A5 is likely to outperform that of the iPhone 4S for many functions. The fact that Apple hasn't yet said one way or another whether Siri will come to devices other than the iPhone 4S also doesn't mean much. The iPhone 4, 3GS, and newer iPod touch models had an exclusive on multitasking for almost exactly six months before iOS 4.2 debuted and brought that feature to the iPad, and the same thing may end up being true for Siri. Here's what I think is the most likely scenario: Siri will remain an iPhone 4S exclusive at least until the third tier of international rollouts completes in December. In fact, Apple will probably wait until after the end of the holiday quarter and bring Siri to the iPad 2 in the first quarter of 2012. Not only will this give market incentive for people to buy the iPhone 4S by having Siri as a device-exclusive feature during the holiday period, it'll also give Apple's servers and Siri's algorithms time to adjust and scale to the number of inquiries it'll receive. Once Siri's beta period ends and international rollouts for the iPhone 4S are reasonably complete, that's the perfect time to bring Siri to the iPad 2 in a dot-update to iOS 5. By that time Siri and its supporting infrastructure will be more mature and able to handle the extra load of adding support for one more device type, and it should also help alleviate the typical post-holiday quarter sales slump. As for the other devices in Apple's iOS stable, like the iPod touch, iPhone 4, and iPhone 3GS, I don't expect them to ever see support for Siri. Siri's developers have already confirmed that many compromises were required to get the service running on the iPhone 3GS, and it's probably the same story for iOS devices with an A4 processor. The 2012 model iPod touch will likely be updated to an A5 processor, however, so we might see Siri support for next year's iPod touch. For the time being, Siri remains an iPhone 4S exclusive and one we have yet to test for ourselves. We look forward to putting this innovative feature under our interrogation lights once the iPhone 4S is released on October 14.
Apple iPhone 4S now shipping in 'one to two' weeks, over 200,000 AT&T pre-orders in first 12 hours
If there was any question of how hot a tamale Apple's iPhone 4S would be, the answer's edging toward muy caliente. AT&T's stated that the iPhone 4S has ushered in its best iPhone launch to date, receiving over 200,000 pre-orders for the device during the first 12 hours of availability (crediting its success to having the only US version operating over 14.4Mb/s HSPA+, aka FauxG). While that's good news for Ma Bell, as of today, you'll be looking at a wait time of "one to two weeks" after placing an order for this latest iThing (Sprint and Verizon included). We've yet to hear how the latter two telecoms have fared, but we'd imagine it won't be a secret for too long -- the iPhone 4S is officially available on October 14th, after all. Full AT&T PR just past the break. [Image from Skyline/Shutterstock]
Apple reportedly working with AT&T to display '4G' in status bar
AT&T is reportedly pressuring Apple to advertise the 14.4 Mbps theoretical maximum download speed of the iPhone 4S as "4G" in the iPhone's status bar. Given AT&T's aggressive attempts to market HSPA+ as 4G, that's not surprising. What is surprising is that according to This is my next, Apple is apparently bowing to that pressure and will show "4G" in the iPhone 4S status bar. AT&T has confirmed it is "working with Apple" on the matter. While HSPA+ is faster than the standard supported by the iPhone 4 and earlier phones, it is not "true" 4G even if AT&T is advertising it that way. Given the litigious nature of the mobile industry, particularly any time Apple's involved, it seems like a terrible mistake for Apple to bow to AT&T and advertise a feature the iPhone 4S doesn't actually offer. If AT&T and Apple do indeed tout "4G" in the iPhone 4S status bar, you can be virtually certain you'll be seeing the following headline or some variant of it all over the Web very soon afterward: "Class action lawsuit begins over false '4G' iPhone claims." You can be just as certain that various pundits will go out of their way to blame Apple more than AT&T. It's all so very predictable that it's hard to imagine what possible advantage Apple sees in agreeing to AT&T's proposal. We've dug through the iOS 5 firmware in an attempt to locate icons for 4G status in the iPhone 4S status bar. We weren't expecting to find such an icon in iOS 5.0, and we didn't -- all that's there are the icons for EDGE, GPRS, and 3G (UMTS). If Apple is indeed planning on hyping 4G in the status bar, it's going to have to come about in a future iOS update.
Daily Update for October 7, 2011
It's the TUAW Daily Update, your source for Apple news in a convenient audio format. You'll get all the top Apple stories of the day in three to five minutes for a quick review of what's happening in the Apple world. You can listen to today's Apple stories by clicking the inline player (requires Flash) or the non-Flash link below. To subscribe to the podcast for daily listening through iTunes, click here. No Flash? Click here to listen.
