MacRumors

Research firm IHS iSuppli today released the results of a new study tracking global semiconductor sales in 2012, predicting that Apple will expand its lead on the strength of 15% growth in the face of a stagnant market. Apple first topped the list in 2010 after quickly rising from third place in 2009 and sixth place in 2008.

Apple is maintaining its lead in semiconductor purchasing because of continuing strong demand for its products, combined with the company’s capability to maintain beneficial relationships with more than 150 suppliers that provide components or offer manufacturing and assembly services.

But aside from maintaining its global dominance in chip purchasing, Apple is also outgrowing the other OEMs and making gains in the various regions of the world. For Apple, this translates into competitive advantages when it comes to manufacturing electronic products.

The report notes that Apple's increasingly dominant market position, which is estimated to see nearly double the revenue of second-place Samsung this year, gives Apple significant market advantages in terms of controlling pricing, availability, and product roadmaps.

Apple is predicted to continue expanding its lead in 2013, with IHS iSuppli's estimates pegging Apple at 12.3% growth next year, the highest of any top-ten global customer.

One of the new features found in OS X 10.8 Mountain Lion is PowerNap. PowerNap was introduced at WWDC 2012 and allows your Mac to continue to perform tasks such as receiving email and updating software even when it's sleeping.

Apple lists the full capabilities in this Knowledge Base document. Capabilities include getting new Mail, syncing Calendar, Contact and Reminder changes, and more. When plugged into power, your Mac can download software updates and make backups with Time Capsule.

Apple only supports PowerNap on 2011 MacBook Airs and beyond as well as the 2012 Retina MacBook Pro. The capability should move over to more of Apple's laptops as Apple makes a full transition to SSD. Built-in flash storage is listed as one of the requirements of the technology. Apple just released a firmware update that enables this functionality in the 2011 MacBook Airs, while support for the Retina MacBook Pro is said to be "coming soon".

Today, Apple launched OS X 10.8 Mountain Lion for $19.99 on the Mac App Store. The latest version OS X provides a number of new features borrowed from iOS as well as some Mac specific ones. This overview video from Apple provides a quick look at the biggest new features.

Other sites have put together more detailed videos showing smaller changes and a more detailed look at AirPlay mirroring.

In general, the reception has been positive amongst reviewers, especially given the $19.99 price tag. The launch, however, has resulted in the removal of OS X Lion from the Mac App Store. While this isn't too big a surprise, it could leave some owners of older Macs stuck if their Mac isn't supported by OS X Mountain Lion but were supported by OS X Lion.

The other major hiccup in today's launch was the distribution of codes for Apple's Up To Date program. The Up To Date program offers Mountain Lion OS X to customers free of charge if they have bought a new Mac since June 11th. Apple seems to be aware of the issue and is working on reissuing faulty codes.

There have been a number of OS X Mountain Lion related software updates and news items today. If you aren't following our full RSS feed, you may have missed the many updates on our Mac Blog today:

- Adobe and Avid Report Only Minor Issues With Mountain Lion
- Microsoft Confirms Office 2011 and 2008 Compatibility with OS X Mountain Lion
- Create a Bootable Mountain Lion USB Key Installer
- Apple Updates iPhoto, iMovie and Aperture Alongside OS X Mountain Lion
- Apple Updates iWork with iCloud and Dictation for OS X Mountain Lion
- Apple Launches 'OS X Server' for Mountain Lion for $19.99

Tidbits offers a nice overview of tips and little details from Mountain Lion. Macworld has posted a number of detailed looks at Mountain Lion's Safari, Messages, and Reminders. Finally, MacRumors readers have been posting in our Mountain Lion forum for questions and tracking issues.

On the heels of Apple's earnings release yesterday in which the company announced a record 17 million iPads sold during the second calendar quarter of 2012, research firm Strategy Analytics has published its estimates of the total global tablet market for the quarter. According to the report, Apple captured 68.3% of the market, up from 62% in the year-ago quarter and the company's highest share in nearly two years.

Apple shipped a robust 17.0 million iPads worldwide and maintained its strong market leadership with 68 percent share during the second quarter of 2012. Apple continued to shrug off the much-hyped threat from Android and the iPad’s global tablet share is at its highest level since Q3 2010. [...]

Despite high expectations for companies like Amazon, Samsung, Acer and Asus, the Android community has yet to make a serious dent in Apple’s dominance of the tablet market. Unspectacular hardware designs, limited uptake of cellular models and a modest number of tablet-optimized services have been among some of the main reasons for Android’s mixed performance so far.

Google's Android platform actually kept pace with the overall market's 66.8% growth, enabling it to hold steady with 29.3% of the market. Apple's 83% growth instead came at the expense of smaller players such as Microsoft, which saw its share of the market fall from 4% to 1.2% as the company has yet to roll it out its major tablet effort with Windows 8.

Apple's continued strength in the tablet market comes even though a number of observers have predicted an erosion of its dominant position amid increasing numbers of low-cost Android tablets. But with Apple riding high on the launch of the new third-generation iPad just prior to the start of the second quarter, Apple is improving its position in the market. With rumors of an "iPad mini" coming later this year, Apple could further solidify its leadership position by competing more closely on price with some of the recent high-profile Android entrants such as Amazon's Kindle Fire and Google's just-introduced Nexus 7.

After Apple's Podcasts app was released last month, many users had complaints about bugs, crashes and other issues. All Things D says that an update should debut later today that will fix the problems and "vastly improve it":

Podcasts users take note: Apple has been hard at work tweaking the app to fix the problems that currently plague it and sources say the company expects to post an update to it this afternoon that should vastly improve it.

Nearly two-thirds of reviews for the Podcasts app on the App Store gave it a one - or two-star review, with the app having a two-and-a-half-star review overall -- one of the lowest of all Apple's apps.

Podcasts had traditionally been housed in the iTunes app on iOS devices, but Apple has been working to streamline the user experience by breaking out some categories into their own apps, including Podcasts and iTunes U.

Update: As noted by Jim Dalrymple, Apple has released an update to the Podcasts app with these changes:

Podcasts 1.0.1 provides a number of improvements, including:

• Significant improvements to performance and stability
• Podcasts in your library now show the number of unplayed episodes
• Top Stations now show the podcast title if artwork is missing
• Playback speed is now remembered when playing the next episode
• Fix for a problem where the Subscribe button is inactive
• Resolution of an issue where Top Stations artwork may not appear

Podcasts is a free download for the iPhone and iPad on the App Store. [Direct Link]

With today's launch of OS X Mountain Lion, Apple's Up-to-Date program has officially gone live. The program allows any user who purchased a Mac on or after June 11 to receive a free upgrade to OS X Mountain Lion if their system came with OS X Lion preinstalled. Customers who purchased server models such as the Mac mini server and Mac Pro server configurations can also receive free upgrades to Apple's latest server tools released alongside Mountain Lion.

Apple is apparently experiencing some early difficulties with the program, however, with some users reporting that their Mac App Store redemption codes for OS X Mountain Lion are not working and others still waiting to receive their codes. Some users were able to obtain codes earlier this week when the program briefly went live prematurely, but the redemption difficulties appear to be affecting both early recipients and new applicants.

Apple support staff have acknowledged the difficulties and are advising customers that they may need to wait up to three days to receive replacement codes, although some replacement codes are reportedly already coming through without any action required by the users. Submitting the up-to-date program application a second time fails to generate new codes, as Apple's systems recognize that the machine serial numbers have already been used and thus refuse to complete the repeat applications.

Customers who purchased new Macs between June 11 and today have until August 24 to claim their redemption codes for OS X Mountain Lion, but many are undoubtedly anxious to install the new operating system as soon as possible. Users who purchase new Lion-equipped Macs starting tomorrow will have 30 days from the date of purchase in which to claim their free upgrades to Mountain Lion.

With today's release of Safari 6, there has been some confusion over the fate of Safari for Windows. Apple's Safari download page that previously allowed users to download versions for Mac or Windows now redirects to the main Safari page highlighting Safari 6 for Mac, with no mention of Safari for Windows anywhere in Apple's revamped Safari feature pages.

But while Safari for Windows has not been upgraded to version 6 and thus has not received the many new features included for Mac in that release, Apple does appear to be planning to continue quietly offering Safari for Windows. Listings for Safari updates in Apple's support download pages had previously summarized all available Mac and Windows version and provided a link to the general download page, but Apple has now placed Safari for Windows on a dedicated page linking directly to the download.

Safari for Windows remains at version 5.1.7 initially released alongside OS X 10.7.4 in early May. The software is clearly not a high priority for Apple, as evidenced by the removal of all mentions of the Windows option from the main Safari product pages, but the company is keeping the most recent version available for download. It is unclear, however, whether Apple has plans to bring additional feature updates to the browser.

Update: Apple has pulled the standalone Safari 5.1.7 for Windows download page, redirecting visitors to the previous version that links to the now-discontinued general Safari download page. As a result, it appears that Safari for Windows is now not directly linked anywhere in Apple's official download pages.