BGR Daily Breaking Stories

Daily Headlines TUESDAY, NOVEMBER 4, 2014

Report warns Apple might be facing a huge iPhone 6 Plus recall A report from Business Korea warns that Apple might be facing a huge potential iPhone 6 Plus recall, not because it bends — something that is a problem for many buyers, even though the company tried its best to minimize its seriousness — but because of a different kind of issue that might be affecting the 128GB iPhone 6 Plus model. A few days ago, various reports claimed that 128GB iPhone 6 Plus owners have discovered a strange type of error affecting their devices, particularly ones that store very large libraries of apps: the device would constantly crash and reboot, with Apple not being able to fix the issue. Now, this new report says there may be a memory defect affecting these 128GB iPhone 6 Plus units, specifically with the “controller IC of triple-level cell (TLC) NAND flash” memory.  MORE → This awesome Android trick will add iOS-like notification counts to your app icons There is little question that Android’s notification system is far more comprehensive than Apple’s iOS notification system, especially in Android 5.0 Lollipop. iOS has certainly narrowed the gap in recent years as it continues to borrow various notification functions from Android and other platforms, but Android is still the king in terms of flexibility and utility. There is one great feature notification feature that iOS has had since day 1, however, and it’s still painfully absent from Android — until now.  MORE → iOS 8.1.1 has been released to testers – here are the biggest changes Apple is not done releasing iOS 8 updates, as the company has seeded the first iOS 8.1.1 beta to developers. Following the initial iOS 8 release, Apple came up with two quick updates with fixes and improvements, including iOS 8.0.1 and iOS 8.0.2 (which was supposed to fix issues caused by iOS 8.0.1). Apple then released iOS 8.1, a major update for iOS 8 that also brought users several bug fixes, but also several new features, including Apple Pay support for iPhone 6 and iPhone 6 Plus, and SMS Continuity support.  MORE → Android 5.0 Lollipop is here… but you can’t have it just yet Google on Monday pushed Android 5.0 Lollipop source code to the Android Open Source Project (AOSP), and while that alone might be interesting news for Android fans and developers, it doesn’t mean you should get too excited just yet, as the Search giant is yet to roll out the first Lollipop builds for supported Nexus devices.  MORE → Does Apple another major iCloud security issue on its hands? After having to deal with the iCloud-related Nudegate scandal, stop the Chinese iCloud attacks, and reassure users that its cloud has not been hacked, Apple might have a new iCloud problem to deal with, as various people report that Apple is silently uploading unsaved documents to iCloud after a Mac is updated to Yosemite.  MORE → With Lollipop incoming, KitKat is now on almost a third of Android devices Google has posted new Android distribution numbers on its Android Developers site, revealing that KitKat is now installed on almost a third of Android devices that connect to the Google Play Store, just as it’s getting ready to roll out Android 5.0 Lollipop.  MORE → Time Warner Cable insists you’ll love data caps, no matter how often you say ‘no’ Like the sleazy guy in the infamous “10 Hours Walking in NYC as a Woman” video who followed a woman down the street and couldn’t take a hint that she wasn’t interested, Time Warner Cable is going to keep trying to sweet talk you into accepting data caps. DSLReports notices that Time Warner Cable CEO Rob Marcus told investors during a recent earnings call that the company is gong to keep pushing capped data plans onto consumers, who so far have told the company that they want absolutely nothing to do with such plans.  MORE → Watch John Oliver rip into Lowe’s ridiculous in-store helper robots Lowe’s is testing out robot replacements for some of its in-store staff and the results so far are ridiculous. As shown in promotional videos, the robots will roll up to you when you enter the store and ask you if you want any help in a dreadful monotone voice that makes Siri sound like it has the expressive vocal range of Meryl Streep in comparison. Then when you show the robot the item you’re looking for, it takes a few seconds to scan and process it before showing it to you on a screen and asking it to confirm that this really isn the item you’re looking for. This seems more cumbersome than interacting with a human being who likely (though not always) knows instantly what the item is and has a good idea of where to find it.  MORE → Apple Pay just went live for a bunch of huge new partners Apple Pay launched to great deal of fanfare last month, but it was only the beginning of what Apple hopes will be a continual rollout of new partners and features for the payment service in the coming months and years. In fact, it appears that the second wave of banks has already started to go live, as MacRumors notes that Navy Federal Credit Union, USAA, US Bank and PNC Bank cards are now compatible with Apple Pay.  MORE → These are the processors that might power the ultra-thin 12-inch Retina MacBook Air Apple is widely expected to launch a smaller, thinner, fanless 12-inch Retina MacBook Air laptop next year, and it may feature a design made possible by Intel’s Core M “Broadwell” processor the chipmaker launched this year. CPU World has listed four brand new Intel Core M processor versions that are even better than the Core M chips Intel already launched, with MacRumors saying these Core M versions are destined for Apple’s upcoming Retina MacBook Air.  MORE →

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