Mac of the Future: the CPU

Imagine a 13-inch Macbook Air with a retina-class display that weighs a few ounces less than the current model. Or maybe it weighs the same, but you can use it all day without plugging into wall power.

iPhone 5 edges toward supply-demand balance

iPhone 5 supplies continued to improve this week as Apple reduced the wait time for delivery to “2 weeks” on its online store.

The unusual world of Mac prototypes

If you’ve been a Mac fan for more than a few years, chances are you’ve seen or even used Apple’s most famous computer models. What you don’t often see are the machines that Apple kept to itself—the prototypes that never reached the market.

The unexplored history of translucent Apple design

The arrival of the iMac in 1998 signaled more than a renaissance for Apple; it sparked a widespread industrial design revolution. Apple’s teardrop-shaped machine gained a large part of its appeal from its translucent Bondi blue plastic housing, which dramatically set the iMac apart from a sea of beige-boxed PCs.

Apple to kill Messages beta for OS X Lion next month

Apple has told Mac owners running OS X Lion that the beta of Messages, its replacement for both the older iChat instant messaging service and SMS (short message service) texting, will expire Dec. 14.

Google sandboxes Flash in Chrome for OS X

Google this week announced it had shipped a stronger Flash Player sandbox for the OS X version of Chrome, making good on an August promise to ship a Mac browser better able to ward off exploits of the Adobe software.

Design, supply component issues may be hurting iPhone 5 production

Stringent iPhone 5 production specifications established by Apple and supply issues with new components like the Lightning port and larger screen could be responsible for Foxconn’s delays of the handset, analysts said on Wednesday.

iOS version of Microsoft Office reportedly set for 2013 release

The long wait for an iOS compatible version of Microsoft Office may be coming to an end. Reports on the Internet contend that Microsoft’s office productivity suite will be available for the mobile platform next year.

Apple not likely to ditch Intel chips for Macs in near future

There’s a certain sense to recent rumors that Apple may trade the Intel chips in its Macs for the company’s own processors. Apple is, after all, the poster child of a company that wants to control its own destiny: It makes its own hardware and software, and is a proponent of the “walled garden” ecosystem exemplified by its iTunes Store and App Store. Even more recently, Apple has taken deeper control of its processor design; the iPhone 5’s A6 chip uses Apple’s own custom ARM-based design, rather than taking a standard ARM core and just dropping it in, as the company has with past iOS devices.

OS X Snow Leopard shows signs of becoming Apple's XP

One in four Macs now run OS X Mountain Lion, Apple's newest operating system, data released last week showed.

But there are signs that OS X Snow Leopard, an edition shipped in August 2009, may be the Mac's equivalent of Microsoft's Windows XP, an OS that stubbornly refuses to go away.

New Mac mini offers an attractive bang for the buck

Last year’s Mac mini brought a number of drastic changes for the compact desktop computer: Core i5 processors that replaced the aging Core 2 Duo CPUs, Thunderbolt ports, and the discontinuation of a built-in SuperDrive. The new Mac mini may not be quite as revolutionary as the 2011 models, but its updates are still significant.