Apple is bringing its acclaimed HomePod speakers to Malaysia. The HomePod lineup offers stunning audio experiences for every corner of your home. Starting May 10th, both the full-sized HomePod (2nd generation) and the compact HomePod mini will be available for purchase.
Source: Apple
The lineup delivers powerful, room-filling audio that will elevate your listening experience. The larger HomePod boasts rich bass and crisp highs, perfect for audiophiles. It utilizes advanced computational audio and a custom-engineered woofer to deliver clear vocals and immersive instrumentals. Additionally, room sensing technology adjusts the sound based on its placement, ensuring optimal acoustics in any room.
Source: Apple
The mini, despite its size, packs a punch. Its Apple-designed acoustic waveguide delivers rich 360-degree sound, while the S5 chip and software work together to optimize volume and clarity.
Your Smart Home Command Center
Both models go beyond just music. With Siri built-in, you can control your smart home with simple voice commands. Set lights, adjust thermostats, or even check the temperature in a room – all hands-free. They also act as a smart home hub, allowing you to connect and manage various smart home accessories through the Apple Home app.
Source: Apple
The HomePod lineup integrates seamlessly with the Apple ecosystem. Handoff allows you to transfer music playback between your iPhone and HomePod effortlessly. Multiroom audio lets you play the same song throughout your house or create different sound zones with multiple HomePods. Additionally, pairing with Apple TV 4K unlocks a powerful home theatre experience, complete with enhanced dialogue clarity.
Pricing and Availability
The HomePod (2nd generation) will be available in Malaysia for RM1,549, while the HomePod mini comes in at RM529. Pre-orders start May 1st through Apple’s online store and app, with in-store availability starting May 10th.
Attention all Apple TV fans! At long last, the time has come. Designed to make your viewing experience even more fluid and enjoyable, Apple has launched a new look for the Apple TV app after weeks of beta testing.
Searching through seemingly infinite menus and categories is a thing of the past. With its redesigned user interface and convenient sidebar, the app is now easier than ever to use. Apple TV+ originals, Major League Soccer Season Pass, a vast collection of films and TV shows for sale or rental, and your favourite channels and apps like Disney+, Paramount+, and Max are all at your fingertips.
Browse categories like “New Shows & Movies,” “Top Charts,” “Trending,” and “For You” under the revamped “Home” section. Using this selected collection, you can be confident that you will always have access to the most recent releases, best sellers, and personalised suggestions.
The updated software is helpful for more than simply its users. With the new profile function, families with more than one Apple TV user can now get suggestions tailored to their tastes. Toggle between profiles on the tablet in your living room; you can find your recommendations and carefully selected the “ Up Next “list.
Exciting new features for the Store tab are also part of the redesigned Apple TV app. With the recent merger of TV shows and films, finding a new series to binge-watch has never been more straightforward. Discover many popular streaming services on your Apple TV by adding a specialised Add Channels & Apps shelf.
With this update, the standalone apps for iTunes Movies and TV Shows also end as users will be redirected to the Apple TV app instead if they purchase or rent out movies or shows. Rumours have built that Apple has plans on making Apple TV into a streaming Hub for everything and not just Apple TV Plus.
Proton, a well-known Malaysian automaker, plans to revolutionise its in-car experience by trying to incorporate Android Auto and Apple CarPlay. ACO Tech, the company that created Proton’s ATLAS infotainment head unit (IHU), has announced it intends to provide these features to Proton vehicles.
Sunny Wang, Head of Project Management at ACO Tech, announced the plans to integrate the systems at a media preview of the new Proton S70 sedan. He stated that Android Auto and Apple CarPlay integration is actively being worked on and that users will not have to wait long before they can mirror their smartphone screens on the ATLAS IHU. However, it is crucial to remember that the integration process entails more than just a simple software update. According to Proton’s Deputy CEO, Roslan Abdullah, changes to the IHU’s chipset are required to support Android Auto and CarPlay.
Source: ACO TECH
Roslan Abdullah also stated that the change and implementations must be on its hardware and not just software. This is due to the changes to the IHU’s chipset. Despite admitting the long-overdue nature of Android Auto and Apple CarPlay support, Roslan stated that the transition would be difficult due to the requirement for hardware modifications.
Furthermore, obtaining licences from Google and Apple is one of the most complex aspects of the process. Roslan stated that these conversations had been “a bit of a hassle”. This is mainly due to the complications caused by the geopolitical tensions and technological rivalry between the United States and China.
Sadly, as of now, neither Proton nor ACO Tech have specified a definite date for Android Auto and Apple CarPlay availability in Proton cars. While the next Proton S70, which will be on sale on November 28, will not include Android Auto and Apple CarPlay compatibility, the confirmation of active development suggests that these features are on the way for Proton users.
Apple’s “Scary Fast” event brought us a family of new processors that up the ante when it comes to performance. The new M3 series of processors, consisting of the M3, M3 Pro and the M3 Max, bring along a bevvy of features and optimisations that empower a significant leap over the M1 and even M2’s performance.
The new M3 family of Apple silicone is the first system on a chip (SoC) to utilise the 3nm process in fabrication. This allows Apple to fit more transistors into a smaller space while increasing the processing speed and efficiency. The increased number of transistors has also resulted in the GPU and NPU of the M3 family getting a supercharge.
Apple is touting that the new M3 family of SoCs bring a whole new level of GPU performance with rendering speeds of up to 2.5x faster than the M1 family. This is made possible by a new feature called Dynamic Caching that allocates the use of local memory for processing in real-time. Dynamic Caching ensures that the exact amount of memory needed for the task is used. This feature is made readily available for developers to leverage. It’s also the cornerstone of Apple silicone’s new generation of GPUs.
Source: Apple
Together with this, hardware-accelerated ray tracing is also coming to Apple silicon. Ray tracing will allow programs to render light more realistically and accurately. With ray tracing, designers and developers are able to create more true-to-life renderings and images. If you’re wondering why this sounds so familiar, it’s currently the big thing in gaming. Speaking of, Apple does say that the M3 SoCs are built to handle gaming as well. It will be the first family of Apple silicone SoCs to have gaming specifically on its radar. That said, Baldur’s Gate does run on the Mac running Apple’s M1 and M2 family already.
Source: Apple
In addition, the M3 family is also enabling mesh shading in Macs. This will help deliver more visually complex scenes and more complex geometric workloads when rendering. The M3 family is also far more power efficient handling the same workloads as the M1 with half the power consumption and up to 65% more performance at its peak.
Apple touts that the new M3 chips perform up to 30% faster than the M1 chips and 15% faster than the M2 chips. This is thanks to the new architecture being used in the M3 chips. This performance increase is also seen in efficiency cores of the M3 family resulting in better multithreading performance with up to 35% more performance at its peak.
Source: Apple
Apple is also pushing its boundaries by upping the ante with its Unified Memory Architecture. The M3 family now supports up to 128GB of memory. This will be able to deliver even faster workloads without the need for copying instructions and datasets multiple times. What’s even more significant is the workloads that are enabled with the larger memory available. AI developers will be able to execute larger transformer models with larger amounts of parameters with increased memory support.
Together with the improvements for the CPU and GPU, the NPUs on the M3 family are also getting a bump in performance. The M3 family’s NPU is up to 60% faster than the M1 family and 15% faster than the M2 family. All three chips also come with an advanced media engine which provides hardware acceleration for the most popular video codecs including H.264, HEVC, ProRes and ProRes RAW.
Apple users, get ready for a minor change in your monthly fees. As a result of Apple’s recent price review, the company has raised the prices of Apple TV Plus, Apple Arcade, Apple News Plus, and the Apple One packages. This change is in keeping with the industry-wide pattern of rising subscription costs.
For international Apple users, prices are increased between USD$2 and USD$3. Moving forward, the prices will be:
Subscription
Original Price (USD)
New Price (USD)
Increase (USD)
Apple TV+
USD$6.99
USD$9.99
USD$3.00
Apple Arcade
USD$4.99
USD$6.99
USD$2.00
Apple News+
USD$9.99
USD$12.99
USD$3.00
This price hike also affects the Apple One packages, which bundles several of Apple’s services. Apple One has three tiers which all have been subjected to price raises as well.
Subscription
Bundled Services
Original Price (USD)
New Price (USD)
Increase (USD)
Individual
iCloud+ (50GB) Apple TV+ Apple Music Apple Arcade
USD$16.95
USD$19.95
USD$3.00
Family (5-users)
iCloud+ (200GB) Apple TV+ Apple Music Apple Arcade
USD$22.95
USD$25.95
USD$3.00
Premium
iCloud+ (2TB) Apple TV+ Apple Music Apple Arcade Apple Fitness+ Apple News+
USD$32.95
USD$37.95
USD$5.00
However, even with all the current price hikes, it is of note that other Apple services like Apple Music, Fitness+, and iCloud+ memberships are unchanged as of now.
The recent price hikes also affect Malaysian Apple users particularly those who use the Apple One subscriptions. Apple One members in Malaysia will see a small rise in the monthly fee for the service.
Subscription
Bundled Services
Original Price (MYR)
New Price (MYR)
Increase (MYR)
Individual
iCloud+ (50GB) Apple TV+ Apple Music Apple Arcade
MYR29.90
MYR34.90
MYR5.00
Family (5-users)
iCloud+ (200GB) Apple TV+ Apple Music Apple Arcade
MYR39.90
MYR44.90
MYR5.00
Premium
iCloud+ (2TB) Apple TV+ Apple Music Apple Arcade Apple Fitness+ Apple News+
MYR78.90
MYR84.90
MYR6.00
Other well-known subscriptions like Netflix have also seen a price hike which is becoming a recent trend among other subscriptions too. These price hikes are unfortunately necessary to cover the ever-increasing price of delivering excellent content and services to users.
Subscribers to Yes 5G (YTL Communications) prepare to take a bite of the iPhone as Yes 5G is gearing up to offer the popular smartphone! The carrier will be offering the complete iPhone 15 lineup consisting of the iPhone 15, iPhone 15 Plus, iPhone 15 Pro, and iPhone 15 Pro Max.
The full pricing and plan details will be unveiled by Yes 5G on November 2, 2023. Customers eager to get their hands on these cutting-edge devices can make their purchases starting from November 3, 2023.
Yes 5G is gearing up to offer competitive monthly instalment plans, along with their Yes Infinite+ packages. These packages provide unlimited, uncapped 5G data, swift internet speeds, and unrestricted calls, all without any fair usage policy.
To stay ahead of the game and be the first to receive updates on pricing and plan specifics, you can register your interest on Yes 5G’s official website.
Stay tuned for more exciting developments as Yes 5G prepares to introduce the iPhone 15 lineup, promising a new level of innovation and performance.
Apple has just expanded its iCloud+ plans. Starting today, users have the option to pick from two new iCloud+ plans: 6TB for $29.99 per month and 12TB for $59.99 per month.
These plans come hot on the heels of Apple’s iPhone 15 and iPhone 15 Pro launch event, where the focus was on the impressive 48MP Main cameras, designed to deliver exceptional photo and video quality. With iCloud+, users can safely store extensive collections of high-resolution photos and videos in the cloud. This makes them accessible seamlessly across all their Apple devices and on the web. iCloud+ also helps you optimize space usage on your iPhones by automatically preserving beautiful, optimized versions of their media in the cloud while freeing up space.
Source: Apple
But that’s not all; iCloud+ offers a range of premium features like Private Relay that safeguards your Safari browsing, ensuring privacy from network providers, websites, and even Apple itself, all without compromising your browsing experience. It also comes with Hide My Email which allows users to generate unique, random email addresses whenever needed that can be used to sign up for newsletters and more without revealing your own email allowing you to sign up for newsletters, offers, and more without revealing your personal email address. You’ll also be able to access HomeKit Secure Video which stores home security videos with end-to-end encryption.
iCloud+ plans can be shared with up to five family members.
In the wake of Apple’s grand unveiling of the iPhone 15 family, a familiar but bittersweet ritual has taken place – the discontinuation of older iPhone models to make way for the new. While this is an expected part of the annual iPhone event, there was one unexpected twist: the demise of the beloved iPhone 13 mini, marking the end of an era for compact smartphones.
The iPhone 13 mini joins the ranks of discontinued models, alongside the iPhone 14 Pro, iPhone 14 Pro Max, and the aging iPhone 12. However, the absence of a compact iPhone in Apple’s current lineup is a poignant shift. The 5.4-inch iPhone category, once represented by the iPhone 12 mini and iPhone 13 mini, has now vanished.
The decision is a testament to market dynamics, as these compact models struggled to find widespread appeal compared to their larger counterparts. With the iPhone 13 mini’s departure, users favouring more petite smartphones will face a dwindling selection.
While Apple’s official sales channels may cease offering the iPhone 13 mini, it’s possible that some retailers may continue to carry limited stock. Additionally, online marketplaces like eBay might provide a lifeline for those determined to secure one of the last 5.4-inch iPhones.
This poses a poignant change in Apple’s mobile strategy. However, on the other side of the fence, we’ve seen Android phones like the ASUS Zenfone lineup do particularly well despite its compact size. Do you believe there is still a place for compact smartphones in today’s world dominated by larger screens? Share your thoughts on this farewell to the iPhone 13 mini and the compact phone era.
USB-C isn’t just on the iPhone 15, it’s also coming to the 2nd Generation AirPods Pro. Oh, don’t forget, it’s got MagSafe too.
The AirPods Pro (2nd generation) comes with enhanced sound quality and double the Active Noise Cancellation of the previous model. This means you can immerse yourself in your music or calls like never before, without being disrupted by external noise. The advanced Transparency mode also lets you stay connected to your surroundings when needed.
It also comes with Spatial Audio technology which gives a three-dimensional soundstage that makes movies, music, and games come to life. While immersive audio is nice, it would be lost without the best fit when it comes to the AirPods itself. The new AirPods Pro come with an expanded range of ear tip sizes to ensure the perfect fit for every user. The AirPods Pro (2nd generation) will be compatible with the Apple Vision Pro that is set to debut early next year in the U.S. This combination unlocks 20-bit, 48 kHz Lossless Audio with ultra-low latency.
No need for lightning anymore when you have a USB‑C connector to the AirPods Pro (2nd generation). Now, you can use a single cable to charge multiple devices, from your Mac and iPad to your AirPods and iPhone 15 series. USB-C isn’t the only thing new on the 2nd Generation AirPods with USB-C. It’s also got an IP54 rating for both the earbuds and case.
They incorporate recycled materials, such as 100% recycled rare earth elements in all magnets and 100% recycled gold in printed circuit boards. The packaging is redesigned to reduce waste, aligning with Apple’s goal to eliminate plastic from packaging entirely by 2025.
Pricing and Availability
The AirPods Pro (2nd generation) with MagSafe Charging Case (USB‑C) will be available for USD$249 or MYR1,099.
For added personalization, these AirPods can be engraved for free, offering a mix of emoji, names, initials, and numbers.
Apple is pushing the boundaries with their new lineup of Apple Watches with the Apple Watch Series 9 and the Apple Watch Ultra 2. The latest additions bring along with them several new features including a new processor – the S9 SiP, enhanced Siri capabilities, Precision Finding for iPhone with UWB and a brand new double tap gesture.
Source: Apple
At the heart of the Apple Watch Series 9 and Watch Ultra 2 lies the custom Apple silicon in the S9 SiP, representing Apple’s most advanced watch chip to date. This chip not only boosts overall performance but introduces novel features like the double tap gesture and on-device Siri with secure health data access. The Series 9 also incorporates a 4-core Neural Engine, capable of processing machine learning tasks twice as fast as its predecessor while maintaining an 18-hour battery life.
Source: Apple
Navigating the Apple Watch Series 9 and Watch Ultra 2 has become even more intuitive with the introduction of the double tap gesture. By tapping the index finger and thumb of their watch hand together twice, users can perform a range of actions with ease. This includes stopping timers, controlling music playback, answering phone calls, and even capturing photos using the Camera Remote. The gesture, enabled by the faster Neural Engine, will be available in a forthcoming software update.
Source: Apple
Apple has pushed the display capabilities further, increasing the maximum brightness of the Series 9 to 2000nits, double that of its predecessor. The Ultra 2, on the other hand, has a higher 3000 nits brightness. This should mean that the two watch models should be legible even in bright sunlight, and the display can dim to just one nit in low-light environments.
The Apple Watch Ultra 2 introduces the Modular Ultra watch face that takes full advantage of the larger display. It provides real-time data, including seconds, altitude, or depth, and offers an unprecedented level of customization for outdoor activities, sports, and water adventures.
Siri can now process requests directly on the device, eliminating the need for internet connectivity for certain tasks. This not only results in faster and more reliable responses but also maintains privacy. Siri can also access and log health data from the Health app, offering users more control over their health and fitness inquiries.
Both the Series 9 and Ultra 2 come with a second-generation Ultra Wideband (UWB) chip that enables Precision Finding for the iPhone 15 family which comes with the same chip. Your Apple Watch can literally guide you to your iPhone 15 with its visual, haptic and audio guidance.
Source: Apple
The Ultra 2 continues to be the more rugged Apple Watch. Complete with an app ecosystem to support it, the Ultra 2 will be able to handle high altitudes and deep waters.
100% Carbon Neutral – If you choose correctly
Of course, as Apple progresses towards its 2030 environmental goal, the Apple Watch Series 9 and Ultra 2 now come with carbon-neutral options for straps. In fact, with these two models, the right pairing of the Watch and strap will mean that your Apple Watch is 100% Carbon Neutral.
This is thanks to a 78% reduction in emissions when it comes to transport and production as well as a sleeker, more compact box that allows for more Apple Watches to be transported. Apple has also empowered its partners to work towards being carbon neutral. As such, certain bands, like the new sports band are made completely of Carbon neutral and eco-friendly materials.
Apple Watch SE
Source: Apple
Also along for the ride is the new Apple Watch SE which continues to offer core Apple Watch features at an affordable price. This year, the Apple Watch SE is being updated with support for low heart rate notifications, Fall Detection, Emergency SOS, Crash Detection, and watchOS 10.
Pricing and Availability
The Apple Watch Series 9 and Apple Watch SE are available on the official website and Apple Store app. The Series 9 starts at USD$399 or MYR1,899, and the SE begins at USD$249 or RM1,199.
The Apple Watch will be priced at USD$799 RM3,799. It is available in a sleek 49mm size and becomes carbon neutral when paired with the new Trail Loop or Alpine Loop bands. These bands are available in various colours, offering both style and sustainability.
