MacRumors

Apple has teamed up with Google, Microsoft, and Mozilla to block a web browser root certificate that was being used by the Kazakhstan government to surveil its citizens.

The certificate allowed authorities to monitor people's online activity by intercepting and decrypting HTTPS traffic from residents in Nur-Sultan, the capital city of Kazakhstan.

Local ISPs were required to block foreign websites including Google and Twitter, unless users had the certificate installed, but Apple and the other browser makers on Friday acted in unison to ban the certificate, according to ZDNet.

Since the ban, Chrome, Edge, Mozilla, and Safari refuse to work with the certificate, and the browsers throw up error messages to users who installed it, telling them the certificate can't be used because it isn't trustworthy.

As ZDNet notes, this is the second time the four browser makers have banned a certificate issued by the Kazakh government for man-in-the-middle attacks. The first block came in August 2019, and acted to prevent a certificate used to intercept traffic for various Russian and English-speaking social media sites.

Note: Due to the political or social nature of the discussion regarding this topic, the discussion thread is located in our Political News forum. All forum members and site visitors are welcome to read and follow the thread, but posting is limited to forum members with at least 100 posts.

At $550, the AirPods Max are quite a bit more expensive than noise cancelling headphones from other companies like Sony and Bose, many of which are highly rated. In our latest YouTube video, we compared the ‌AirPods Max‌ to the Sony WH-1000XM4s, the Bose NC Headphones 700, and the Sennheiser Momentum Wireless to see if they're worth the premium price tag.

All three of the competing headphones are available at $350 retail, but oftentimes, there are sales. With the Sony XM4's, for example, you can get them on sale for $280, which is a steal for the functionality. The Bose 700s are going for about $340 right now, and the Sennheisers are about $300.

When it comes to design, the ‌AirPods Max‌ look and feel like $550 headphones thanks to the aluminum cups and the mesh ear cushions, and while aesthetics are subjective, they're arguably the most unique of the bunch. The Bose 700's have a classy, futuristic look and the Sennheisers have more of a retro flair. The Sony headphones are the most basic, but are overall fine.

We think the ‌AirPods Max‌ are the best looking headphones of the bunch followed by the Bose and Sennheiser headphones with Sony coming in last, but it's also worth noting that the ‌AirPods Max‌ are heavy and are in fact the heaviest of the bunch.

Comfort is also super subjective and is going to depend on each person's head shape, ears, and size. Most people have found the ‌AirPods Max‌ to be comfortable, but some find the weight to be unbearable. With their plastic design, the Sony headphones are the lightest of the bunch for those who want less weight.

We found the ‌AirPods Max‌ to be most comfortable, followed by the Sennheiser headphones, the Sony headphones, and then the Bose, which are also somewhat heavy and have smaller earcups. That said, it's all quite close.

When it comes to buttons, Apple did a good job with controls for the ‌AirPods Max‌ with the Digital Crown and toggle for activating ANC, but we'll never understand why there's no power button or the strange case choice. The ‌AirPods Max‌ case is not protective, it doesn't look good, and it's all around the worst case that comes with any of the headphones.

In terms of sound quality, the ‌AirPods Max‌ sound fantastic, but again, choosing one set of headphones over the other really comes down to preference. We thought the ‌AirPods Max‌ had the most balanced sound experience of the bunch. The Sennheiser headphones really did poorly compared to the others, but the Bose and Sony headphones both sounded great, though leaned toward being bass heavy. That said, all of the headphones except the ‌AirPods Max‌ have adjustable EQ settings so they can be tweaked to your liking.

This will come as no surprise, but when it comes to Active Noise Cancellation, the Sony XM4's and the ‌AirPods Max‌ win out. Sony has always been the best at noise cancellation, and the ‌AirPods Max‌ are truly competitive. All of these options have solid ANC capabilities, though, and it's a close call.

Our videographer, Dan, goes into much more detail on each of the different headphones, so make sure you watch the full video for a complete picture of the similarities and differences.

All of the headphones we've covered are excellent options, and choosing between them will depend on your budget and your personal tastes. We think for most people, the ‌AirPods Max‌ may not be worth that premium price tag because there are other great headphones that are much more affordable available, but the ‌AirPods Max‌ are certainly at the head of the pack and when it comes down to it, we prefer them over the competing options.

Apple is temporarily closing its retail locations in the Los Angeles area due to a rising number of COVID-19 cases in Southern California, reports Bloomberg. Update - Dec. 19: Apple has extended the closures to all stores in California indefinitely.

This is the first time in several months that stores in Los Angeles have been closed. Apple has several major retail locations in the area, including stores at The Grove and Beverly Center shopping centers. Two stores in Los Angeles are closed today, and 11 additional stores are closing on Saturday. There is no word on when the stores will re-open.

All of Southern California is under a stay at home order that went into effect earlier in December, but the order does not require non-essential retail stores to shut down. Instead, stores and malls are able to operate at a reduced capacity, so Apple is not required to shut down by the state, but is likely doing so to protect its employees.

Coronavirus cases are also surging in the San Francisco Bay Area where Apple's headquarters are located, but the company has not yet closed stores there. Most stores are, however, operating in a limited "Express" mode that allows for order pickups and genius bar appointments, but does not let people browse.

Apple began closing retail locations earlier this year and many of its stores were shut down for months in the spring. Apple began reopening stores in June, but said that stores could close again depending on local guidelines and conditions.

In all stores, Apple is requiring face masks, limiting store occupancy, conducting temperature checks, implementing social distancing measures, and deep cleaning regularly.

Note: Due to the political or social nature of the discussion regarding this topic, the discussion thread is located in our Political News forum. All forum members and site visitors are welcome to read and follow the thread, but posting is limited to forum members with at least 100 posts.

Instagram is today rolling out support for the new ProRAW photos that are able to be captured with the iPhone 12 and the iPhone 12 Pro Max.

Instagram developer Tim Johnsen shared the news on Twitter, where he also said that ProRAW photos in the DNG format are not able to be edited on Instagram. Further details aren't available, but it seems that Instagram is converting the ProRAW file into JPG that's shown on Instagram.

Support is limited, but those who take ProRAW photos and edit them outside of Instagram will be able to share the resulting image directly on the social network without having to create a separate JPG. ProRAW images are large in size, coming in at around 25MB, so Instagram is compressing them.

ProRAW is an ‌iPhone‌ 12 Pro and ‌iPhone 12 Pro Max‌ feature that was enabled with the iOS 14.3 update. It takes advantage of the computational photographer features that Apple adds into its ‌iPhone‌ while also giving users control over white balance, noise reduction, sharpening, and more.

As photographer Austin Mann highlighted earlier this week, ProRAW is ideal in situations where Apple's general algorithms may struggle, such as mixed indoor lighting, extreme low light, and super high dynamic range images.

Qualcomm today shared benchmark results for the Snapdragon 888 SoC that will be used in flagship Android phones coming out in 2021, and it's not able to keep pace with the A14 chip in the iPhone 12 models, nor the A13 in the ‌iPhone‌ 11.

AnandTech compared Qualcomm's benchmarks to benchmarks of Apple's devices, with the ‌iPhone‌ winning out in Geekbench 5 and GFXBench tests.

The Snapdragon 888 chip earned a single-core score of 1,135 and a multi-core score of 3,794, while the ‌iPhone‌ 12 Pro with A14 chip earned a single-core score of 1,603 and a multi-core score of 4,187.

In the GFXBench test, which measures GPU performance, Samsung scored an 86 (in frames per second), compared to the ‌iPhone‌ 12 Pro's 102.24. Sustained performance is unknown as of yet and will depend on the chip's power consumption, but AnandTech believes the Snapdragon 888 could ultimately win out over the ‌iPhone‌ if power consumption is competitive.

While the Snapdragon 888 doesn't look like it'll match the peak performance scores of the A13 or A14 SoCs used in Apple's iPhones, sustained performance will depend quite a bit on the power consumption of the chip. If this lands in at between 4 and 4.5W, then the majority of flagship Android phones in 2021 will likely be able to sustain this peak performance figure and allow Qualcomm to regain the mobile performance crown from Apple. Otherwise if the chip has to significantly throttle, then 888 will probably fall short of retaking the crown. But even if that's the case, for Android users it shouldn't matter too much: the generational leap over 2020 phones would still be immense, and by far one of the largest GPU performance leaps Qualcomm has been able to achieve to date.

The Snapdragon 888 chip isn't quite performing at the level of the A13 or A14 chips from Apple, but it is a significant improvement over prior-generation Snapdragon chips used in current flagship Android smartphones. CPU performance is up 25 percent and GPU performance is up 35 percent.

AnandTech says that as these benchmarks were provided by Qualcomm and not independently obtained, we have to trust that Qualcomm's numbers are accurate, but the site expects the figures to be "accurate and reproduced in commercial devices."

For this week's giveaway, we've once again teamed up with Throwboy to offer MacRumors reader a chance to win a soft, squeezable version of a classic Apple product or design.

Throwboy makes a bunch of different plush pillow options priced at $30 to $40, and each one is carefully crafted to look like an Apple product of some kind, such as a classic Mac, an iPhone, or an iPod, plus there are also versions made to look like Mac icons, such as the well-known rainbow-colored spinning wheel of death.

The 1977 pillow, for example, is modeled after the Apple II, which was introduced by Steve Jobs and Steve Wozniak as the first personal computer aimed at a consumer market.

Throwboy designed the pillow version to look like the real version with embroidered display and keyboard on a soft, beige base that's ultra plushy and comfortable. There's a rainbow logo and carefully constructed details make it so there's no mistaking the pillow for an Apple design.

The 2001 pillow is meant to look like Apple's original iPod with screen and appropriate click wheel embroidery that's perfect for fans of Apple's iPod.

‌iPhone‌ enthusiasts will like the 2007 pillow, which looks like the original ‌iPhone‌ with plush back front, silver back, and a now-retired Home button embroidered at the bottom.

The rainbow-colored Spinning Wheel Pillow will be immediately familiar to any Mac user because it mimics that well-known icon that pops up whenever your Mac freezes up when completing a task. Its six colors brighten up any room.

All of Throwboy's pillows are soft, huggable, and the perfect size to be used as a throw pillow on a couch or a chair. They also make great gifts for Apple fans.

We have 10 of Throwboy's pillows to give away to MacRumors readers, and each winner can choose from the 1977 Classic Mac pillow, the 2001 iPod pillow, the 2007 ‌iPhone‌ pillow, or the Spinning Wheel pillow.

To enter to win our giveaway, use the Gleam.io widget below and enter an email address. Email addresses will be used solely for contact purposes to reach the winners and send the prizes. You can earn additional entries by subscribing to our weekly newsletter, subscribing to our YouTube channel, following us on Twitter, following us on Instagram, or visiting the MacRumors Facebook page.

Due to the complexities of international laws regarding giveaways, only U.S. residents who are 18 years or older and Canadian residents (excluding Quebec) who have reached the age of majority in their province or territory are eligible to enter. To offer feedback or get more information on the giveaway restrictions, please refer to our Site Feedback section, as that is where discussion of the rules will be redirected.

The contest will run from today (December 18) at 11:00 a.m. Pacific Time through 11:00 a.m. Pacific Time on December 25. The winners will be chosen randomly on December 25 and will be contacted by email. The winners will have 48 hours to respond and provide a shipping address before new winners are chosen.

A set of schematics and programming instructions for a prototype version of the Apple II home computer recently sold for $630,272 from RR Auction, the company said today.

The documents were written by Apple co-founder Steve Wozniak and included five pages of circuit schematics and notes on sheets of graphic paper, a 12-page handwritten programming instruction guide with 28 steps, and six photocopied pages that were headed "Bus Sources," "System Timing," "Display," "Sync Timing & Adr. Gen," and "Timing," featuring several annotations.

Wozniak added notations, circuit changes, and programming notes to these pages as he hand-wired the Apple II prototype, and he confirmed their veracity prior to the auction.

Accompanied by a signed letter of provenance from Wozniak: "These documents, circa 1975, are my original Apple II prototype schematics and programming instructions. They are precious. On these work-in-progress diagrams, you can even see my breadboarding technique, where I'd go over drawn connections in red as I soldered the wires in. At the time, I favored using a purple felt tip pen for writing, so it's interesting to see these notes decades on. The prototype was hand-wired while I was still an engineer at Hewlett-Packard's Advanced Product Division, where I was involved in the design of hand-held calculators."

Along with these notes, a functional Apple-1 computer was also sold off, fetching a price of $736,862. Apple-1 machines were the first computers created by Apple and were sold by Steve Jobs out of his parents' garage. There were only 175 Apple-1 computers created, and less of half of those are still in existence.

Other items sold at the auction include a "Battleship" keyboard signed by Steve Jobs and Steve Wozniak that went for $74,535 and a Steve Jobs-signed Monsters, Inc cue sheet that went for $12,501.

The popularity of iPhone 12 models has led to soaring demand for Qualcomm's 5G modems and RF chips, helping to propel the chipmaker's revenues past that of rival Broadcom in the third quarter of 2020, according to Taiwanese research firm TrendForce.

Qualcomm reported $4.9 billion revenue in the third quarter, a 37.6% increase over the year-ago quarter, compared to $4.6 billion for Broadcom. TrendForce said Qualcomm's "remarkable performance" is partly attributed to re-entering Apple's supply chain earlier this year, after the two companies settled a lawsuit last year.

Apple's rekindled partnership with Qualcomm might not be for good, however, as Bloomberg recently reported that Apple has started developing its own cellular modem for future iPhones. The info was reportedly shared by Apple's senior vice president of hardware technologies Johny Srouji at a town hall meeting with Apple employees, and the move was expected after Apple purchased the majority of Intel's smartphone modem business last year.

In a research note shared with MacRumors today, Barclays analysts Blayne Curtis, Thomas O'Malley, Tim Long, and their associates provided some additional details about Apple's in-house modem, claiming that the chip will be "very much a high-end modem" with support for ultra-fast mmWave 5G, as with Qualcomm's Snapdragon X55 modem in iPhone 12 models.

"We believe that Apple has actually been working on this 5G modem for over a year and that this is very much a high-end modem, including support and chipsets for mmWave," the analysts said. "We do not believe they are [working] on any RF components beyond the mmWave."

mmWave is a set of 5G frequencies that promise ultra-fast speeds at short distances, making it best suited for dense urban areas. By comparison, sub-6GHz 5G is generally slower than mmWave, but the signals travel further, better serving suburban and rural areas. mmWave support on iPhone 12 models is limited to the United States.

As part of their settlement in 2019, Apple and Qualcomm announced that they had reached a multiyear chipset supply agreement, so it likely that it will be at least a few more years until Apple's in-house modem appears in devices.

Apple recently shared a manual [PDF] that outlines the steps that one should take to protect their devices and their data when personal safety is at risk. This is designed for people who need to protect themselves from being tracked by a former loved one, a stalker, or another malicious person.

There are a lot of location sharing and data sharing tools that are available in iOS, and those who aren't as familiar with how those services work will find detailed instructions on protecting their location, data, and more.

If you're concerned that someone is accessing information you did not share from your Apple device, this guide will also help you identify risks, and walk you through the steps to help make the technology you rely on as private and secure as you want it to be.

The document instructs users to update their software to the latest version of iOS, restore the device to factory settings, and protect a device with a passcode, passwords, Touch ID, and Face ID. It has steps for protecting an Apple ID with two-factor authentication and details on how to use built-in privacy tools to prevent apps from accessing data.

There are also walkthroughs on making sure location information isn't shared with people that it shouldn't be in the Find My app, and ensuring that iCloud data, photos, calendars, and more are protected and not shared.

The document includes steps on deleting unknown third-party apps and unknown configuration profiles that may be used maliciously for tracking purposes.

It wraps up with several checklists on how to determine if anyone else has access to a device or account, how to to stop sharing with people previously shared with, and how to make sure no one else can see a device's location.

Activity Awards is a new site that offers physical representations of the digital fitness awards that Apple provides when Apple Watch owners meet their goals.

Available in the form of magnets, the Activity Awards are designed to look like the in-app awards that can be earned through the Fitness app. Each magnet is modeled after a different award, with the Activity Awards site offering all kinds of options.

There are awards for meeting goals like 7 day move, exercise, and stand requirements, along with awards for special activity challenges such as the badge that Apple gave out in August for hiking, running, walking, or doing a wheelchair workout of a mile or more.

The magnets are priced from $10.99 to $13.99, and some of them are available in full color or a "black out" mode that's entirely in black and silver.

The magnets are made in the style of enamel pins and are bright, colorful, and well made. They feel like high-quality magnets, and have a built-in magnetic backing to attach them to refrigerators or other magnetic surfaces.

The Activity Awards have a good weight to them, and the magnetic strength is in line with what I would expect from a premium magnet (I stuck two of them together and it was near impossible to pry them apart).

I did notice some slightly sharp edges on a couple of the awards so I might not let kids play with them, but it doesn't matter too much on a magnetic surface. Some of the magnetic backs also seem to be cracked in half, and I'm not sure what that means for longevity. I also broke two of the magnetic backs in half by stacking them on top of one another to bring them from one room to another, so if you buy these, make sure not to do that.

All of the designs are close to spot on, and there's no mistaking the Activity Awards for the Apple Watch awards that are displayed in the Awards section of the Fitness app. You can't get all of the awards that Apple offers in magnet form yet, but I imagine Activity Awards is working on other options to include in the future.

Activity Awards is not affiliated with Apple and I don't know what Apple thinks about Apple Watch fitness-inspired awards being made available in a format that's making money for someone other than Apple, but the site's founder told me that the Activity Awards are not a 1:1 match to the Apple awards with font and Pantone colors changed for production, plus the design is flat.

The company does want to make it clear that the pins are not coming from Apple and are designed as supplementary and complementary to the Apple Watch.

Bottom Line

Every week, I read stories on the internet from people who have been motivated to get fit thanks to the Apple Watch, and working out and keeping up with a routine can be a lot of work. Having a physical representation of a workout achievement that's visible every day could be inspirational and a reminder of what's been accomplished.

I think the Activity Awards have the potential to be a nice gift for someone who has put a lot of effort into working out with the Apple Watch, or even a self gift for those who want to be reminded of what they can achieve.

Some of the designs, such as the Yoga Award and the Parks Award are also just objectively nice looking and have a nice, neutral design that Apple Watch owners might like to have on the fridge. Activity Awards does have some quality control issues to deal with, so keep that in mind if you plan to buy these. Treat the magnetic backings carefully, because they can break.

How to Buy

Activity Awards can be purchased from the Activity Awards website with prices ranging from $10.99 to $13.99. Sets are also available.

Note: Activity Awards provided MacRumors with Activity Award magnets for the purpose of this review. No other compensation was received.

Last month, Korean website The Elec reported that Apple plans to release new iPad Pro models featuring OLED displays in the second half of 2021, noting that Samsung and LG are already in the process of developing the displays.

However, following recent discussions with Apple suppliers, Barclays analysts Blayne Curtis, Thomas O'Malley, Tim Long, and their associates said that an iPad with an OLED display does not appear to be in the works for 2021. In a new research note, shared with MacRumors, the analysts said a launch is unlikely until 2022 at the earliest.

The timeframe offered by Barclays certainly sounds more reasonable, as many rumors suggest that Apple plans to release at least one iPad Pro model with Mini-LED backlighting in the first half of 2021, and it would seem rather quick for Apple to switch display technologies twice within the same year with the release of OLED models.

Apple already uses OLED displays for the iPhone X and newer and all Apple Watch models, with benefits over LCDs including higher brightness, improved contrast, increased power efficiency, wider viewing angles, and more.

Apple last refreshed the iPad Pro in March, but it was a relatively minor update, with new features including an A12Z Bionic chip that is essentially an A12X chip with an extra GPU core enabled, an Ultra Wide camera, a LiDAR Scanner, and better sounding microphones. Prior to that, the iPad Pro received a major redesign in October 2018, gaining slimmer bezels, Face ID, and a USB-C port instead of a Lightning connector.

Barclays analysts were the first to claim that Apple was planning to stop including a charger with iPhones. In the past, they also accurately revealed True Tone coming to the iPhone 8 and iPhone X, the removal of the headphone jack adapter with iPhone XS and iPhone XR models, and the removal of 3D Touch on all iPhone 11 models.

While we're still many months away from the next-generation "iPhone 13" lineup, Barclays analysts Blayne Curtis, Thomas O'Malley, Tim Long, and their associates have outlined a few expectations for the devices based on discussions with multiple Apple suppliers.

First and foremost, the analysts said iPhone 13 models may support Wi-Fi 6E, providing an opportunity for radio-frequency chipmaker Skyworks.

Wi-Fi 6E offers the features and capabilities of Wi-Fi 6, including higher performance, lower latency, and faster data rates, extended into the 6 GHz band. The additional spectrum will provide a lot more airspace beyond existing 2.4GHz and 5GHz Wi-Fi, resulting in increased bandwidth and less interference for devices that support Wi-Fi 6E.

"The 6 GHz band will perhaps be the most disruptive boon for Wi-Fi users in the last 20 years," said Vijay Nagarajan, an executive at chipmaker Broadcom, in January. "This swath of spectrum, when coupled with Wi-Fi, will power new consumer experiences on smartphones, AR/VR devices and wearables we haven't even yet invented."

"Wi-Fi 6's growth into the 6 GHz spectrum is a game changer for two reasons – the availability of the additional channels and the ability to finally use 160Mhz for high bandwidth applications like AR and VR," said Cisco executive Jayanthi Srinivasan.

Earlier this year, the FCC adopted rules that make 1,200 MHz of spectrum in the 6 GHz band available for unlicensed use in the United States, paving the way for the introduction of devices supporting Wi-Fi 6E.

Both the iPhone 11 and iPhone 12 lineups support the standard, non-6 GHz version of Wi-Fi 6, as does the second-generation iPhone SE.

The analysts also indicated that audio chipmaker Cirrus Logic will supply a new power conversion chip for at least some iPhone 13 models, although it is unclear if this move would have any obvious consumer-facing benefit.

As for the iPhone SE, the analysts believe Apple has no plans to refresh the device in the foreseeable future. The analysts said that while they had heard about a potential larger-screen iPhone SE, rumored to feature a 5.5-inch or 6.1-inch display, the device was not mentioned in any of their discussions with Apple suppliers. In April, well-known analyst Ming-Chi Kuo said the larger iPhone SE was delayed until the second half of 2021.

Barclays analysts were the first to claim that Apple was planning to stop including a charger with iPhones. In the past, they also accurately revealed True Tone coming to the iPhone 8 and iPhone X, the removal of the headphone jack adapter with iPhone XS and iPhone XR models, and the removal of 3D Touch on all iPhone 11 models.

Apple appears to have ended its tradition of making standalone updater versions of macOS available to all users, beginning with macOS Big Sur.

Apple offers its macOS updates through the Software Update pane in System Preferences, but it usually also lets users download the same updates as standalone installation packages, made available on Apple's downloads website.

However, as noted by Mr. Macintosh and shared by The Eclectic Light Company, Apple hasn't released a standalone updater for macOS 11.1 or 11.0.1, despite providing standalone packages for macOS Catalina and Mojave security updates on December 16.

Standalone packages are useful for administrators who want to update multiple Macs with the same 12GB download, especially given that delta and combo packages come in smaller sizes since they include only the files needed for that particular update.

According to Mr. Macintosh, however, Apple is advising users who need standalone updaters to contact them in an "official capacity," although it's not exactly clear what that means.

Apple hasn't confirmed that it has ended update packages for macOS, but the current lack of standalone installers for Big Sur doesn't look particularly good for users who rely on them.

That said, there is an alternative solution in the Sharing pane in System Preferences in the form of a Content Caching option, which enables one Mac to download updates and other Macs on the same network to download them directly from the local Mac.

Apple is offering TikTok users a four-month free trial of Apple Music to newcomers of the streaming service.

As spotted by ApplePost and Apple Terminal, the deal is available to new subscribers through the short-form video sharing app, and offers an additional month on top of Apple's normal three-month free trial for new subscribers.

The promotion runs through January 4, 2021, and the offer's requirements include an Apple ID with a registered payment method.

The offer is delivered in-app via a pop-up notification, but it's not clear what TikTok users are doing to prompt the alert, which also highlights the official TikTok playlists available on ‌Apple Music‌.

Last month, Apple offered a similar Apple Music promotion through the company's Shazam music identification app.

• How to Cancel an Apple Music Subscription

If after activating one of the trial offers you're not convinced, you can cancel your ‌Apple Music‌ subscription without losing your access to the service up until the trial ends.

When Apple unveiled AirPods Max last week, it revealed that they don't come with an on/off power button, but instead enter an "ultralow" power mode when inserted into the included Smart Case. That left a lot of questions about what happens to battery life when they're left out of the Smart Case and not being actively used. However, today Apple has provided some somewhat surprising answers to those questions, suggesting that the Smart Case isn't as essential to preserving battery life as many first thought.

According to Apple, when ‌AirPods Max‌ are taken off but not put in their Smart Case, they enter a "low power mode" after five minutes of being left stationary. If left untouched, they remain in this low power mode for three days, after which the headphones enter an "ultralow" power state that disables Bluetooth and their Find My location to help further retain their remaining charge. From Apple's AirPods Max support document, updated overnight:

If you set your AirPods Max down and leave them stationary for 5 minutes, they go into a low power mode to preserve battery charge. After 72 stationary hours out of the Smart Case, your AirPods Max go into a lower power mode that turns off Bluetooth and Find My to preserve battery charge further.

Apple has also clarified how ‌AirPods Max‌ behave when placed in their Smart Case, and it turns out that the same two distinct low power states are involved, but enabled at different times. The first "low power mode" is immediately activated upon insertion, but the "ultralow" power mode doesn't actually kick in until after 18 hours in the Smart Case.

If you put your AirPods Max in the Smart Case when you're not using them, they go into a low power mode immediately to preserve battery charge. After 18 hours in the Smart Case, your AirPods Max go into an ultralow power mode that turns off Bluetooth and Find My and maximizes battery life.

Based on this description of ‌AirPods Max‌ power-saving modes, it would appear that the headphones enter the same "low power mode" when put down and left alone for five minutes as they do when placed in the Smart Case. However, the same "ultralow" power mode that activates after ‌AirPods Max‌ have been left for 18 hours in the Smart Case takes a full 72 hours to kick in when they are left out of the case.

Before Apple provided the above information, tests conducted by MacRumors suggested that ‌AirPods Max‌ battery drains only slightly faster when left outside of the case – a difference that is likely down to the longer time it takes for the "ultralow" power mode to activate when the headphones aren't in the Smart Case.

Putting aside the seeming arbitrariness of these sleep mode activation times, the main takeaway is that in the short term at least, there's no real power-saving advantage to be had from putting ‌AirPods Max‌ in the Smart Case instead of just setting them down on a desk and not touching them. But if you don't plan to use them again for the next 18 hours, then that's when to put them into the Smart Case, otherwise the "ultralow" power mode will take three days to activate, by which time the battery drain is likely to be a lot more significant.

Given the confusion that has followed the power-saving features of ‌AirPods Max‌, some users have speculated that Apple might be able to add a power-off functionality to the physical controls via a future software update. Is that something you would prefer over the current situation? Let us know in the comments.

iFixit today began disassembling Apple's new AirPods Max headphones for one of its traditional device teardowns, with the aim of determining whether the ‌AirPods Max‌ are repairable to any degree or an "e-waste disaster." The teardown is in progress and will be updated over the course of the next few days.

This is an early, partial disassembly that also includes a quick x-ray look inside the headphones. The x-ray view provides a glimpse at the battery cell in each ear cup, dual-ring speaker driver magnets, alignment magnets, brackets for microphones, and more.

iFixit did not find it easy to get into the ‌AirPods Max‌ and there was quite a bit of glue involved. There are two logic boards inside riddled with chips, which iFixit plans to identify later in more detail.

So far, there are no other details available on the ‌AirPods Max‌ as the teardown is ongoing, but iFixit says that it will be updated over the coming days and there's "lots more to come" including some surprises for headphone fans.

Apple CEO Tim Cook and software engineering chief Craig Federighi will be summoned to testify in the ongoing Apple vs. Epic legal battle, a judge said this week.

The court filing, first shared by iMore, says that Apple had already agreed to make Cook a "document custodian." Apple wanted a condition that would limit Cook's deposition to four hours, but the court says that the condition is not appropriate as Epic will not be able to assess necessary deposition length until the full range of documents in the case are made available.

Apple wanted to have Erik Neuenschwander serve as a second document custodian instead of Craig Federighi, but the court has ruled that Federighi should be the one to testify in the dispute.

Apple also must provide extensive documentation and data related to an App Store study conducted by Analysis Group that compared App Store fees with fees from other platforms. Apple had not been planning to share those documents under an attorney work product privilege as Apple is also using Analysis Group as an expert consultant, but the judge said Apple has to provide the information to Epic.

Epic has complained that it is skeptical Apple has produced all relevant employee communications, as some emails included hyperlinks to cloud-based documents and Epic has to ask Apple to provide each of the linked documents. Epic wanted Apple to provide all hyperlink documentation, but the court sided with Apple on this point and said that Apple does not need to identify all hyperlinked documents because of the burden of the work. Apple does, however, have to provide hyperlinked documents for a "reasonable number of emails."

The Apple vs. Epic dispute will continue on with smaller matters such as document requests over the course of the next several months as the two companies prepare for their July 2021 hearing where they will battle it out in court.