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Enlarge / Pictured: Apple's 2022 Studio Display. (credit: Andrew Cunningham)
In the subscribers-only section of his weekly newsletter, Bloomberg reporter Mark Gurman (who has reported accurately on new Apple hardware in the past) claims that Apple will introduce an external Mac monitor that can act as a smart home display when a Mac goes to sleep or is shut down.
The feature would be available on at least one monitor in an upcoming lineup that will likely include successors to Apple's Pro Display XDR and Studio Display. The newsletter didn't go into much detail about the upcoming displays beyond the smart home feature.
Like the Studio Display, a new monitor with smart home capabilities would run on a chip first seen in the iPhone. The Studio Display contains Apple's A13 chip—the same seen in the iPhone 11 line of smartphones. The upcoming smart display could potentially run on the A16 seen in the iPhone 14 Pro, since that device introduced a similar always-on display feature to Apple's smartphone lineup.
Enlarge / The backs of the iPhone 14, iPhone 14 Pro, and iPhone 14 Pro Max. (credit: Samuel Axon)
Apple has released bug fix and security updates for several of its operating systems, including iOS 16.4.1, iPadOS 16.4.1, and macOS Ventura 13.3.1.
The iOS and iPadOS updates don't add any new features. Their main purpose is to address two separate major security vulnerabilities, and the release notes include two big fixes.
Apple details the bug fixes as follows:
Enlarge / A GitHub-made image accompanying all the company's communications about 2FA. (credit: GitHub)
Software development tool GitHub will require more accounts to enable two-factor authentication (2FA) starting on March 13. That mandate will extend to all developers who contribute code on GitHub.com by the end of 2023.
GitHub announced its plan to roll out a 2FA requirement in a blog post last May. At that time, the company's chief security officer said that it was making the move because GitHub (which is used by millions of software developers around the world across myriad industries) is a vital part of the software supply chain. Said supply chain has been subject to several attacks in recent years and months, and 2FA is a strong defense against social engineering and other particularly common methods of attack.
When that blog post was written, GitHub revealed that only around 16.5 percent of active GitHub users used 2FA—far lower than you'd expect from technologists who ought to know the value of it.
Enlarge / Cross-platform voice chat has arrived on the PlayStation 5. (credit: Samuel Axon)
This week, Sony rolled out Discord voice chat support for PlayStation 5 consoles, marking the first time a third-party OS-wide game voice call option has been available on Sony's consoles.
Previously, PlayStation 5 users could display what game they were currently playing on their Discord profiles, but they couldn't communicate with other players without using their phones, tablets, or computers.
The rollout follows a similar one on Microsoft's Xbox consoles last fall. Discord voice calls had long been available on PC, Mac, iOS, and Android. The only major gaming platform outlier is Nintendo's Switch.
Enlarge / The Sonos Era 100 and Era 300 speakers. (credit: Sonos)
After months of detailed leaks, Sonos has finally announced its next generation of wireless speakers. Dubbed the Era 300 and Era 100, they replace the longstanding Sonos One and emphasize spatial audio or stereo sound, respectively.
Let's start with a look at the Era 100, which directly replaces the Sonos One in the lineup with a slight $20 price hike to $249.
The Era 100 has two tweeters, which work in combination with the speaker's ability to analyze a room to produce a custom sound field and provide true stereo sound; the One wasn't able to provide true stereo audio. The Era 100 still has just one woofer, but it's 25 percent larger than the woofer in the One, offering improved bass performance.
Opening up the new HomePod is a lot easier than opening the previous model. [credit: iFixit ]
iFixit has published a short video of a teardown of the new, second-generation HomePod that launched on February 3 for $299. There's perhaps not as much to see as there is in an iPhone or Mac teardown, but the important thing is that it's relatively good news for repair shops or users who want to go the DIY repair route.
When iFixit did its first teardown of the original HomePod, it was an ugly sight—plastic pieces stuck together required prying, and pieces had to be destroyed to get in at all. The original video was a bit comical to watch for how extreme the process was—Apple clearly did not intend anyone but its own technicians to open the device.
People eventually figured out better ways to do it, but it was never simple or easy. The discontinuation of that first HomePod was surely welcome news for a lot of fixers.
Enlarge / Two 2021 MacBook Pro models, side by side. (credit: Samuel Axon)
Over the past two years, Apple has completed an overhaul of its entire laptop lineup. That means it’s as good a time as any to dive in for people who have been holding out on upgrading an older MacBook.
But which MacBook is the best one to pick up? That depends a lot on your specific use case, and that’s what we’ll explore here today.
Typically, buying guides pick the diamonds out of the rough—the “rough” being hundreds of subpar products. But when recommending a MacBook, it’s a simpler affair. There aren’t that many of them to pick from. But because they typically cannot be upgraded, there are some consequential choices you’ll need to make before buying.
Enlarge / The PlayStation 5.
In a blog post published on Monday, Sony hardware VP Isabelle Tomatis announced that there is now an "increased supply" of PlayStation 5 game consoles after more than two years of shortages. "If you’re looking to purchase a PS5 console, you should now have a much easier time finding one at retailers globally," she wrote.
This is the second time this month Sony has publicly said that it believes its PlayStation 5 supply woes have concluded—the first was during a press conference at this year's Consumer Electronics Show.
In the blog post, Tomatis pinned the prior struggles on "unprecedented demand." That seems to be true, according to analysts who watch Sony and the video game industry—but there may have been other factors at play, such as pandemic-related supply constraints for some components.
Enlarge / Nintendo's promotional key art for the launch of GoldenEye 007 on Switch. (credit: Nintendo)
Today marks the long-awaited rerelease of the Nintendo 64 classic GoldenEye 007 on the Nintendo Switch. As was announced before the launch, the game supports widescreen. When I learned that, my first thought wasn't "Oh, nice!" Rather, it was "OK, but what about the rest of the library?"
To be clear, there's no easy way to make old 4:3 games fill up a modern 16:9 aspect ratio, and that's not something I would recommend in this case. But the solution used by the rest of the library of old games running within the Nintendo Switch Online service—enclosing every game in horribly distracting and potentially destructive gray borders—is, well, awful.
So as Nintendo finally adds one of the most beloved Nintendo 64 games to Switch Online, allow me a moment to vent some frustration on behalf of many players.
Enlarge / The backs of the iPhone 14, iPhone 14 Pro, and iPhone 14 Pro Max. (credit: Samuel Axon)
Apple released iOS and iPadOS 16.3, macOS Ventura 13.2, and watchOS 9.3 today. The updates focus primarily on bug fixes and under-the-hood improvements, but there is one notable addition: Apple ID got support for hardware security keys.
Once they've updated to the new software, a user can opt to make a device like a YubiKey a required part of the two-factor authentication process for their account. It's unlikely most users will take advantage of this, of course, but for a select few, the extra security is welcome.
Other additions in iOS 16.3 include support for the upcoming new HomePod model, a tweak to how Emergency SOS calls are made, and a new Black History Month wallpaper.
All told, it looks like every other recent MacBook. [credit: Samuel Axon ]
One of the interesting side effects of Apple's move toward using its own silicon in the Mac is that the Mac update cycle now looks a lot more like the iPhone's: mostly predictable, regular updates that offer modest generation-to-generation boosts to performance and maybe a few additional refinements or new features.
That's very much the case with the 2023 MacBook Pro. For most intents and purposes, it is the 2021 MacBook Pro. The only difference is the inclusion of the new M2 Pro and M2 Max chips for boosted CPU, graphics, and machine learning performance over 2021's M1 Pro and M2 Max, plus some connectivity upgrades that directly address some of our very minor quibbles with the otherwise excellent 2021 models.
That said, the 2021 MacBook Pro was far from a disappointment when it launched, and the market hasn't changed enough in the past two years to make the mostly similar 2023 models any less attractive. These are still the best laptops you can buy for many use cases—provided you don't mind spending a small fortune, that is.
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