MacRumors

As part of its quarterly earnings release today, U.S. Cellular announced that it will begin carrying Apple products later this year, although the carrier offered no additional details on its plans.

"We have a number of strategies in progress to increase loyalty and attract more customers, including our announcement today that we will begin offering Apple products later this year. By further strengthening our device portfolio, we'll give consumers another great reason to switch to U.S. Cellular, and enable our existing customers to choose from an even wider variety of iconic smartphones, and enjoy the outstanding U.S. Cellular customer experiences they deserve. Our smartphone penetration is currently 43 percent of core market customers and growing quickly. We believe there will be strong, ongoing demand for smartphones and data products and services from our customers, and we have significant room for growth in this area.

The move marks a reversal for U.S. Cellular, which said in late 2011 that it had declined to carry the iPhone due to "unacceptable" terms being offered by Apple.

Carriers offering the iPhone generally see short-term hits to their profitability due to upfront subsidies that are typical in the U.S. wireless industry, although many carriers have viewed that impact as acceptable in order to gain access to the popular device. Apple has also routinely demanded that carriers commit to purchasing certain numbers of iPhones over a period of years, something that some carriers have been reluctant to do for fear of being stuck with unsold devices.

U.S. Cellular, which has 5.7 million subscribers, may become the last of the top U.S. carriers to offer the iPhone. Major carriers Verizon, AT&T, Sprint, and T-Mobile all now offer the device, while Leap Wireless/Cricket began selling the iPhone last year. MetroPCS is also likely to begin offering the iPhone following its merger with T-Mobile, although an offering is said to not be imminent. The last of the top carriers, TracFone, also offers the iPhone through its Straight Talk partnership with Walmart.

Update 9:37 AM: U.S. Cellular has issued an additional statement to AllThingsD:

We will be selling iPhone products later this year. We don’t have any additional information at this time but will follow up closer to the launch. The deal we’ve made to sell iPhone products is right for our business today, because we now have an LTE solution that enables a successful partnership with Apple.

Update 10:27 AM: Dow Jones Newswires reports that U.S. Cellular has committed to purchase $1.2 billion worth of iPhones over a three-year period.

Apple has posted a new contest on the App Store [Direct Link], offering a $10,000 gift card to whomever downloads the fifty billionth app from the App Store, similar to previous promotions. Apple said during its most recent earnings call that the company has surpassed 45 billion app downloads.

Apple's most recent contest was for 25 billion downloads back in February 2012. This time around, Apple is also giving $500 gift cards to the next fifty people to download apps after the fifty billionth.

Apps have revolutionized the way we play video games, consume news, do business, educate, communicate, create art, and so much more. As we approach 50 billion app downloads, we'll be awarding a $10,000 App Store Gift Card to the lucky customer who downloads the 50 billionth app, and a $500 App Store Gift Card to each of the next 50 people to download an app.

The download count currently stands at just over 49.2 billion.

After Google Now was added to the Google Search app last week, many users began complaining that the app was draining battery by constantly accessing the iPhone’s Location Services.

According to a Google employee who posted on the Macworld forum (via The Next Web), Google Now does not excessively drain battery, despite the fact that the app often causes the Location Services icon to remain active.

Hi there,
I’m with Google and wanted to address this issue:
Reports that Google Now on iOS drains battery life are incorrect. We understand people’s concern about seeing the Location Services icon stay on when they use Google Now. Many apps that keep the icon on actually do drain the phone’s battery because they require very accurate location. (For example, some apps have to run your GPS all the time during navigation to keep you from missing your turn.) This update to the Google Search app is built very differently: it uses cell towers and wifi hot spots for much lower battery impact.

The employee, who was confirmed to be working for Google by The Next Web, goes on to say that Google Now was tested for several months on iOS without reports of significant battery impact. In the Google Search app description, Google clarifies that the app does not access the iPhone’s GPS, using cell towers and Wi-Fi hotspots as the employee claims.

Google Now, which is Google’s version of a virtual assistant, continually accesses user data to provide information like local weather updates and traffic conditions, which is what may be causing issues for some users.

Not all Google Now users appear to be experiencing battery problems, with some MacRumors forum members reporting no excessive battery drainage while others report rapid battery loss.

Apple today released a minor iOS 6.1.4 update, bringing an updated audio profile for speakerphone. The new version, which arrives as Build 10B350, appears to only be for the iPhone 5.

The update did not involve a beta testing period for developers and follows the release of iOS 6.1.3 in mid-March.

A new national stolen phone database is having little effect on smartphone thefts in the U.S., according to an article in The New York Times. The country's four major carriers all contribute to the database, which lists stolen phone ID numbers that should not be activated on domestic networks. However, the database appears to be ineffective for several reasons.

For one, the database has no effect on phones taken overseas, where many stolen phones end up. Second, the unique identifiers can be changed by organized theft rings. As a result, some law enforcement authorities have begun pressing smartphone manufacturers to build a kill switch into phones.

George Gascón, San Francisco’s district attorney, says handset makers like Apple should be exploring new technologies that could help prevent theft. In March, he said, he met with an Apple executive, Michael Foulkes, who handles its government relations, to discuss how the company could improve its antitheft technology. But he left the meeting, he said, with no promise that Apple was working to do so.

He added, “Unlike other types of crimes, this is a crime that could be easily fixed with a technological solution.”

The Times also compares smartphone theft to car theft, which has plummeted in recent years because of technological changes in automobiles that make them more difficult to steal and part out.

Cynical observers note that Apple and other carriers financially benefit from phone theft because most victims buy another phone, though Apple has gone to some expense to develop the 'Find My iPhone' service and to encourage iPhone owners to activate the service during the setup process.

Google does not include any such service in Android, though there are some third-party products that are similar to Apple's service.

As noted by The Verge, Intel late yesterday released details on its next-generation integrated graphics offerings arriving as part of the company's Haswell processor lineup. The new graphics options consist of three primary levels: an Intel HD Graphics 5000 to be packaged as part of 15-watt chips destined for ultrabooks, an Intel "Iris" Graphics 5100 to be paired with 28-watt mid-range chips targeted at larger ultrabooks, and an Intel "Iris Pro" Graphics 5200 for the highest-power chips.

The company claims its new Intel "Iris" Graphics, embedded in upcoming Haswell CPUs, can offer double or triple the performance of the Intel HD Graphics 4000 that comes with current Ivy Bridge processors. That's significant: typically each generation offers only a double-digit percentage boost.

That doesn't mean every new Haswell processor will come with quite that level of graphics performance, though.

AnandTech has more, highlighting how ultrabooks, which would include Apple's MacBook Air, will see a lesser but still significant boost in graphics performance with Intel HD Graphics 5000.

Although Ultrabooks (now 15W) won’t get full blown Iris performance, they should still see a healthy increase in GPU performance compared to where they are today (50% improvement in 3DMark) at a lower TDP. The move to a full speed GT3 part (Iris) should more than double performance in 3DMark.

Apple is expected to embrace Intel's forthcoming Haswell chips in its next-generation notebook lineup, which may be introduced as soon as next month's Worldwide Developers Conference.

CNET reports on a sneak peek from Adobe product manager Tom Hogarty showing off the company's concept for Lightroom-style photo editing on the iPad. The app would rely on cloud-based connections to serve as a companion app to the full Lightroom software, but offer a number of higher-end features for on-the-go photo editing.

He wouldn't promise when the app would ship or what exactly it would do, but he did demonstrate some features of the prototype software running on an iPad 2. He also offered several details about its features:

- The ability to edit photos taken in raw photo formats, including Lightroom develop-module parameters like exposure, clarity, shadows, highlights, and white balance.

- Cloud-synchronized editing so that changes made on a tablet arrive on the same photo on the PC.

- The ability to zoom all the way to 100 percent for checking photo focus and details.

Hogarty also noted that he would like to bring features such photo sorting and flagging to the app, although other features such as brushes for tweaking photos have not been included.

The app is clearly a work in progress, with the feature set still yet to be finalized and performance issues remaining, but Adobe has made clear that it wants to make some of the same powerful photo editing tools from Lightroom available to photographers on the go. For photographers who travel and spend significant amounts of time in the field, an iPad capable of performing some Lightroom-style editing on raw images could significantly improve their efficiency and workflows.

Apple has added new storage options to its iMac lineup, allowing users to choose either a 256 GB or 512 GB flash storage drive as part of the order customization process. The new options are available as $300 and $600 surcharges respectively to replace the 1 TB traditional hard drive that is standard across all iMac models.

Previously, the 21.5-inch iMac had not been available with dedicated flash storage options, only offering the standard 1 TB traditional hard drive and a $250 Fusion Drive option. Apple's Fusion Drive marries a 128 GB flash drive with a 1 TB traditional hard drive to seamlessly provide fast access to most-used files while also offering relatively cheap mass storage for the remainder of the user's storage needs. Those options remain available, but for those looking for an all-flash storage solution, Apple is now offering that in 256 and 512 GB capacities.

For the 27-inch iMac, Apple did previously offer an all-flash storage solution, but only as a 768 GB drive carrying a $900 upgrade fee. The 27-inch iMac is also available with 1 TB and 3 TB traditional hard drive options, with each of those also available in a Fusion Drive configuration. But with the addition of 256 GB and 512 GB flash options, Apple is now offering users who do not need massive amounts of storage the ability to maximize speed on their machines.

(Thanks, Steve!)

Renowned Apple journalist Jim Dalrymple has confirmed earlier reports that Apple has pulled engineers off OS X 10.9 in order to finish iOS 7 on time with a one word post:

Yep.

A report from AllThingsD earlier today said that Apple was in a repeat of the scenario from 2007 wherein the company pulled engineers off the development of OS X Leopard to work on the first iPhone.

Apple sources told ATD that it's "not as much of a fire drill" and that iOS 7 "will ship on time". Apple hasn't actually announced a ship date for iOS 7, so "on time" is subjective at this point. However, Bloomberg said earlier today that the public launch of the software was on schedule for "as soon as September".

T-Mobile's acquisition of MetroPCS was finalized today, but the merger will not bring the iPhone to MetroPCS customers in the near future. T-Mobile CEO John Legere, who spoke to AllThingsD, said it is possible that MetroPCS might be able to offer the iPhone at some point, but no plans are currently in the works.

As for the iPhone coming to MetroPCS, Legere said it's a possibility, but not a foregone conclusion.

"The answer to that is not 'No'," Legere said, but added, "It's not imminent; I think that's safe to say."

Though T-Mobile does not have immediate plans to offer the iPhone via MetroPCS, the company will be moving quickly to offer new MetroPCS-branded devices and transition MetroPCS customers to T-Mobile's network. Legere says that MetroPCS and T-Mobile will be "one integrated company that uses two brands to go to market."

T-Mobile first began offering the iPhone earlier this month, alongside its new contract free "Uncarrier" policy.

According to Legere, T-Mobile's iPhone sales have exceeded expectations, though he did not offer up specific sales numbers. The merger with MetroPCS brings approximately nine million new customers to the network, which could result in even greater iPhone sales if and when T-Mobile decides to offer the iPhone on MetroPCS.

The U.S. Department of Defense is readying a new government approval for iOS devices to be used by military agencies for nonclassified communications. This is apparently a separate approval from the "commercial mobile device implementation plan" that the DoD announced a few months ago.

The Wall Street Journal reports that the certification would not only allow more widespread use of iPhones and iPads across the military, but would signal to other security conscious companies like banks and law firms that these devices are safe to use.

Separately, DISA is expected to rule that Apple's latest operating system, iOS 6, conforms to a different security-requirement guide, these people said. That would allow iPhones and iPads to be used by military agencies for nonclassified communications, like email and Web browsing.

The DoD is also preparing to sign off on Samsung's Galaxy line of phones for similar uses.