**The Anticipation Builds: What to Expect from Apple's New Phone**

As we count down the days until September, excitement and anticipation are building among tech enthusiasts. Will Apple deliver on its promise of a new phone that exceeds our expectations? Only time will tell, but one thing is certain - we're eager to get our hands on it.

**The Latest Leaks and Rumors**

A plethora of rumors and leaks have been circulating about the upcoming iPhone 7, with some sources suggesting a dual camera setup and others pointing out the absence of a Smart Connector. It's clear that Apple suppliers are sharing their insights, but the information is often contradictory, leaving us to wonder what's actually happening behind the scenes. One thing is certain, however - this phone will be a game-changer.

**The Dual Camera with SMART Connector**

One of the most anticipated features of the new iPhone 7 is its dual camera setup, complete with a SMART connector. The SMART connector promises to revolutionize the way we think about smartphone cameras, but for now, it remains a mystery. Will it enhance our mobile photography experience? Only time will tell.

**The Absence of Headphone Jack**

Another rumor that's been making the rounds is the possibility of removing the headphone jack from this year's iPhone 7. If true, it would be a significant departure from Apple's traditional design. But what about alternatives? That's where the genius of the Lightning connector comes in - we've already seen how to hack around the lack of a headphone jack using adapters and third-party headphones.

**Lightning Headphones: A Cautionary Tale**

Mikey Campbell, host of the Apple Insider podcast, recently experimented with using lightning headphones exclusively. The results were mixed, with one issue being that the volume controls became disabled when plugging in to a HDMI connection or projector. While the headphones did sound good and had some interesting features like a built-in remote control, they weren't without their quirks.

**The Sign Smart Headphones: A Compromise?**

Another lightning headphone option, the sign smart headphones, was also tested by Mikey. These headphones have a similar design to the previous one but with an added feature of being compatible with other formats not just lightning. While they didn't entirely eliminate the issue of battery drain, they did offer some convenience and flexibility.

**The Verdict: A Wait-and-See Approach**

As we count down the days until September, it's clear that Apple still has a lot to prove. Will they deliver on their promises? Only time will tell. In the meantime, we can only speculate about what features our new iPhone 7 might hold. One thing is certain - we'll be eager to get our hands on it and see how it stacks up against its predecessors.

**Episode 70 of the Apple Insider Podcast**

That's all for this episode of the Apple Insider podcast. Mikey Campbell will be back with us soon, and in the meantime, you can catch him online at mikeycampbell81 on Twitter or appleinsider.com. Don't forget to tune in next time when we'll have more news, rumors, and insights from the world of Apple.

"WEBVTTKind: captionsLanguage: enyou're listening to the Apple Insider podcast welcome to this week's all new episode 70 of the Apple Insider podcast I'm your host Victor marks and with me this week is Apple Insider editor Mikey Campbell sup guys Mikey I'm so glad you're here Neil's off this week and so we have you filling in slacker no kidding where is that guy when you need him all right he's probably at his apartment staring at a staring at the wall or something I don't know you mean he's not doing anything Incredible or fun uh nothing I know of well you know if he's really smart if he's really smart this Memorial Day weekend he'll go and he'll save up to 300 bucks off popular 13 and 15in MacBook Pros oh tell me more tell me more you can save up to $300 off when you pair instant discounts with exclusive coupons or you can snap up a 2015 12-in MacBook for only $964 with three free accessories free shipping and no sales tax in most US states so this week resellers Adorama B&H and Mac Mall combined to offer the lowest prices across the board on popular MacBooks like 13 and 15in MacBook Pros and are picked for the very best value the remaining 2015 12in MacBooks some include free items like a one-year low Jack subscription or Parallels Desktop 11 for Mac all ship free and many without sales tax so we've got a guide on our website go to appleinsider.com and you can go through our price guide and see which one is the deal for for you yeah I would argue that the uh that the uh price that they're selling the 12-in MacBook at now is what Apple should be selling it for and uh yeah it's just overpriced by a lot well to your mind uh I think to most people's mind I mean I know people are are going to buy it obviously it's a sexy machine but I I think it's overpriced I met a woman in the airport uh in Los Angeles about a month ago and she had the rose gold MacBook 12 in of course and she insisted because I I asked her how do you like it and she said that it was quite possibly the best machine that she'd ever owned it was thin it was light and as far as she could tell it was not underpowered M right so I asked her dutifully you know because I I want to report the truth to you dear listeners I asked what do you use it for and she said that she has Safari tabs open all the time she has like 20 tabs open she has Excel spreadsheets going on in uh the the 2016 Microsoft Office for Mac and she does her whole business she is the owner of her company and she runs her whole business out of this 12-in MacBook spreadsheets in uh web browsing power user material you say I know she's not doing Final Cut Pro but for for she said that if she ever you know when she hired new employees this was the machine she was going to issue them F finica Pro wait do when that when you install that or you try to install that on a MacBook does it just have a pop-up window that says no no I I think it probably allows you to do it but she she insisted that this was great and her business is something about um it's in the Pharma space somewhere she's she's I believe a distributor of pharmaceuticals legitimate ones but uh she's that's what she's using this machine for and she was going to issue them to all of her new employees because she felt it was a fantastic machine for the price cool to each his own I suppose yes well you know she's going to run into trouble at the end of this year isn't she she is well if she doesn't if she doesn't need the PowerHouse then uh then I guess she's okay but for people like uh you and I you know we're uh Road Warriors who don't go on the road I suppose well I'm on the road every month okay well I stay at home all the time so for me uh our favorite analyst Ming Cho he a crowd favorite of course all hail yep he's uh his latest hot off the press bit is so so what does his crystal ball say when he looks deeply into it he's looking into his crystal balls he's uh he's saying that uh Apple's going to release a new slim down 13 and 15in MacBook Pro finally so it's going to be the redesign that everyone's been rumored rumoring rumor mongering about for the past I don't know two years it seems and uh it's going to come with a bunch of pretty crazy crazy componentry if you believe Mr quo okay so so what will this supposed and this is the Q4 rumor this says that that Apple's expected to drastically revamp its Flagship line in the second half of 2016 around the fourth quarter yeah so probably hopefully I'm guessing they're shooting for the holiday season of course but who knows it could come after and this this thing is going to come with Touch ID it is indeed so along with the thin and redesigned form factor it's going to have some sort of touch ID authentication and perhaps not touch ID itself but maybe so um I wish it would yeah so I mean it's going to be something along those lines it's going to also have uh is going to replace the function buttons at the top of the keyboard with a OLED display touch bar for which is kind of cool uh you some you know you know the old IBM thinkpads used to have a little display at the top yeah so this is going to be like an advanced version of that or anything that I mean it's it's cool because um right now you have to you know switch between uh the function keys serve more than one one purpose of course right well they're the F keys and they're also the the screen brightness and so forth and and you know playback and volumes right so I in this case OSX uh OS 10 could um dynamically change that for you use maybe I don't know just just spitballing here but it could dynamically change it between those two or maybe you can even configure your own stuff like uh like the uh uh what is that the the Optimus keyboard from oh right the the keyboard that had oleds in all the keys kind of thing yeah so it could be kind of like that like a roll your own kind of solution which would be cool but I don't think that Apple would give you that much uh leeway as far as customization is concerned but uh aside from that uh usual expansions um uh on the port so USBC going to be carried over from is that going to be the charge port or is that going to be in addition to a MAG safe unclear I don't know if USBC can well depending on the battery oh although he did quote did say that they're bringing over the uh the battery design from the MacBook as well not specifically the rated output but that kind of you know um layered design the multi-tier thing the the Stacked battery that uses all of the available physical space inside the enclosure exactly right so they're going to bring that over um but I don't know if it he didn't really say if there if USBC is going to be used as a a charging thing I don't think it will um just considering that there's ample space on the uh uh logic board and all that good stuff and there's space on the CH be used for more battery uh yeah but I mean Apple's going to they're going to if I mean if if it's a MacBook Pro you're going to expect a certain level of performance and I don't think that they can squeeze that out of a logic board that's the size of the one in the the uh MacBook which is almost like an iOS device in itself so um so I would I would I would not bet on mag safe going away much to the uh much to the happiness of Mr Neil Hughes who uh cannot get enough of the mag safe yeah um and also Thunderbolt three but I don't know exactly he said uh there's going to be Thunderbolt 3 ports but uh considering that Thunderbolt 3 uh also supports the um you know the same form factor as USBC right it uses the same connector so I mean I don't know guess just they could save space by just slapping in like three uh generic looking USBC SL Thunderbolt 3 ports um I don't know if they would actually break it out you know you know how they do now right USB and then Thunderbolt 2 are two separ right but it's an entirely different connector it's using the old uh mini display port micro display port kind of connector right so um yeah so I mean those are the major major things probably get the the usual processor bumps um probably I I would I would guess that we're not going to see huge performance increases probably going to be along the same lines as usual that's what happens when Apple changes the form factor right it it doesn't make the it's the version that follows that really grows the uh so right now they're kind of shooting for as good or slightly better than current performance specs uh in an all new design which would be the major selling point here yeah well I want Touch ID yeah Touch ID is uh cool if they can implement it correctly not just because I want to be able to unlock my laptop with a touch no I I want it I want all of the online purchases yeah that would be cool they launched it and they launched Apple pay for the web at the same time well they're kind of is Apple pay for the web if you use stripe as your processor yeah okay yeah that's true that's true because that's how you know that's how Lyft and Uber are all doing it is they're using stripe as the processor so that you can just do Apple pay within the app like that but well yeah I mean inapp obviously has purchasing but how many web pages are integrating that into their payment uh backbone um not enough because they're all using PayPal at this time yeah or a few of them using Amazon payments damn you Elon Musk but I you know my my end game my end goal here is that Apple pay replaces PayPal for everything for for person to person for for everything I mean that would be I think an obvious I mean obviously they're going for something like that right but you certainly hope so they definitely have the support customer consumer support to throw their weight around a bit um I don't know I don't know I mean it's a good it's a good system I I like it but it's just not offered in the places that I frequent I used it for uh let's see one two I used it for four different transactions today congratulations I used it for one transaction this past uh quarter now I used it at a medical doctor I used it at an eye doctor I used it at a dentist I used it at Walgreens and I used it at the grocery store Food Lion where five transactions Food Food Lion a Food Lion I used it at uh Walgreens Y and that was only because they're the only store that was open that's because you wanted to experiment and see that it worked um kind of the the register or the cashier was not uh not amused by my by here's another dork fiddling with his phone yeah yeah she didn't she didn't seem as happy as I was that it worked well I know you were Overjoyed yeah that's not the only I I got to get back to this cuz you know that's not the only MacBook that's going to launch this here we we that's we're talking about the Prine changes in Q4 right so supposedly there's I I took out my good old my reliable 2015 MacBook Air uhhuh what a champ that thing is well guess what there might not be anymore come darn in 2017 so as some people have theorized quo is saying that Apple's going to just go Whole Hog on the MacBook line and make that the uh Flagship thin and light and I guess for in the near term relegate the air series to the budget model so they're kind of flip-flopping remember when uh remember when uh they had the polycarbonate MacBook was the uh was a budget and then the white MacBook yeah and black book if you had the one year that they did Black right the yeah and then they did education for one year and then they phased it out completely so it's kind of uh they're they're kind of switching places uh the air has been surpassed in thin design by the MacBook um it also has a better screen right the MacBook does better trackpad better trackpad so better everything and uh the writing's kind of been on the wall that Apple's you know slowing down development of the air lineup going to replace it with the MacBook uh but quo is saying I don't know about this rumor because it it's saying he's saying that Apple's going to launch a 13in model and before the MacBook Pros this year so um quarter three I believe he said so clarify this for me we're not going to get a 13-inch MacBook Air we're going to get a 13-in version of the 12-in version yes and is that dumb um it's in interesting uh I mean what do you get more battery a slightly bigger screen I mean it's just a 1-inch diagonal but it is uh to your eyes probably a noticeable difference I guess but um it could give them a little a bit more space to play with uh internal components like um perhaps a slightly beefier processor or uh or more onboard Ram soldered on of course it gives them a little more head SP uh um a little more uh free space to play with right inside the chassis I mean the logic board of the 12in is about the same size as Raspberry Pi at this time mhm yeah yeah and if they grow it by diagonal 1 in okay so maybe they gain uh you know a quarter inch or so on each well a little more than that length well I mean we have to assume that they're going to I mean that extra bit could be um used for a cellular antenna well there's nothing stopping them as you say from from doing a virtual Sim and having the carriers sell service so I mean there has to be something more than just having an extra inch of Retina Display to differentiate the two models I don't think Apple would uh come out with the MacBook you know 13 and just have it be slightly larger than the 12 there has to be something else unfortunately the MacBook Pro moniker is taken so they can't Market it as a stepup model um they just maybe maybe the MacBook 4G oh I doubt they do that one can hope there are rumors that you know they're going to they're getting close to uh making everyone's dreams come true well speaking of dreams come true true you know we we've been talking a little bit these past couple of episodes about voice first and and in some cases we' been talking about that in terms of payments and other things about the interface and how Apple TV has Siri but it doesn't really act like a voice first device currently yeah no right and we saw that at Google IO they announced Google announced the Google home their voice first product so their next failure well I don't know about failure as much as the next thing they'll cancel because was too popular they canceled it they've done that before mhm uh okay so it looks as if Apple so Apple bought vocal IQ yes right yes and what was vocal IQ good for what were they what were they about uh well they were a uh uh so kind of a a voice recognition speech recognition company focusing on um cellular right the cellular Market what what was interesting about them is that their technology as I understand it is is one that was able to establish connections between pieces of information so it could actually kind of build its knowledge base and learn over time right and that it's pretty powerful indeed that that instead of having to teach you know instead of having Apple have to teach everything on its back end that it can amass its knowledge base and and grow itself over time and make these connections now sometimes that can go horribly horribly wrong as Microsoft saw with their Twitter bot T it took all of what 48 hours for I think it was less than that wasn't it 24 hours I I think it was like within a few hours I thought I don't know so what happened with Tay um uh basically the uh enterprising internet people taught it to be a racist sexist horrible Internet troll yeah through there so it started out as a subtle teenage personality twitterbot turned into a supremacist overnight although one can argue that Microsoft was uh very successful in its goal right it accomplished its goal it well it I mean it it it accomplished part of its goal it was taught Tay was taught to mimic the behavior of its contemporaries which are basically internet trolls on Twitter bad yeah so so the idea is that Apple bought vocal IQ and is going to take Apple TV and turn it into a Siri based Echo competitor that instead of making a standalone speaker which they could do but they don't want to do they want the Apple TV to be the Hub of everything and so they can simply put on the always on mic and you know use the set top speaker yeah and and go that route yeah uh there's a few snags right that they can run into I mean people the snags well people have been saying I mean they've don't tell me the snags oh uh I'll tell you the snags God tell me the snags so besides the fact they have to update the form factor uh to include something something like a speaker or something well they can use the TV speaker they don't need you always keep your TV on right the beauty of the echo is that it's a standalone device that operates outside of other systems well they don't have to incorporate a speaker they could do it like the dot the Amazon dot you use Bluetooth or ax to pair it to speakers well I guess but who's going to do that well if if Apple TV pairs with a speaker then do it uh I don't know I think I don't know if they would anyway it currently does airplay speaker you can use any airpl speaker you want right but I mean that's reliant on in any case also where are you going to where you going to put it right now my Apple TV I can't see it because it I don't need line of sight because of the Bluetooth Street remote mode so a lot of people hide their stuff in like a cabinet or something which is kind of precludes the whole uh always present Siri anyway so so they're going to make this thing I don't know if they're going to make it I doubt it you don't think so I don't think that they would include um I don't think that they would make an Apple TV an echol like device if they wanted to do that they would have to make a separate device I don't think they would build it into Apple TV maybe I mean people hide stuff right A lot of the time these days I mean you don't keep your component less than you think I don't know anyone who keeps their stuff out uh I know most people that do so go figure anyway yeah I don't I don't know if they're going to do it just because uh there's a lot of hurdles right to get through as far as I think it would do better as a standalone don't you what do some people want that Siri experience but they don't care about streaming content or this is the thing about the way Amazon's gone about it right Amazon's approach has been to build a couple of different products that incorporated to release the code on GitHub that allows anyone to use a Raspberry Pi to create their own Amazon Echo device which doesn't have always you have to wire in a button on the gpio on the Raspberry Pi to initiate it so the same way as using the Siri remote on the Apple tv4 but they're encouraging third parties like Trilby which is the refrigerator magnet whiteboard to be Amazon Echo enabled there is an Indiegogo I saw today that is simply a button with a mic so that you can cheaply place button and mics all around there's a wristwatch that was on one of the kicks on the crowdfunders that has uh has Amazon Echo built into it yeah I mean those are all neat NE IDE Amazon wants everyone to build it into all of their products so that it just works of course they do and what you're going to end up with are products that are compatible with both Amazon Echo and homekit right over time over it's already happening any time no it's already happening it is slowly yeah so what what you're getting at is the notion that Apple's going to go ahead and give third party developers an SDK through which they can interface with Siri right which they've already kind of started doing that a little bit in the Apple TV 4 where they allow you to to allow Siri to index your app so that you can give voice instructions to Apple TV yeah but that's just like a few instruction sets it's very it's comparatively weak sauce right but I mean yeah if you do open up that API depending on what apis they you know are included in the SDK that would be uh that' be pretty powerful right I mean it would expand Siri I don't know unlimited perhaps depending on how much Freedom they give developers which would be interesting I don't know do you think they're playing catchup with other people at this point you feel I don't I I mean from a consumer's perspective seeing that Amazon's got this thing out there and Google already showed it and apple hasn't shown anything the consumer is going to say yeah apples on the back foot playing catchup what you don't know is that they they have vocal IQ they have that team on board they have the knowledge they need to pull this off yeah I was kind of underwhelmed at the uh Siri improvements this past iOS 9 well I don't I don't use them as much as I I think Apple would like me to use them Siri most people use Siri for starting timers in the kitchen which is coincidentally this the same use that is the biggest use of of the Amazon Echo and the only difference is that with the Amazon Echo you don't have to touch your phone to do it and apple could over and all the Amazon Echo heads all the fans of echo tout that as being being so awesome that you don't have to touch your phone and and they're all stupid because and I'm going to get tons of email from Amazon Echo fans but but it's ridiculous because all Apple has to do is turn on always on hey Siri and it doesn't matter that it's your phone or a speaker it's done right you still have the handsfree use mhm so so this is not a big hurdle but that's one of the features that the Amazon echoe heads totally love is that they can start a kitchen timer and not have to grab for their phone or they can add to the shopping list without having to grab for their phone great Apple turns on Hy Siri and it's done right always on H Siri and it's the same thing I'm waiting for something groundbreaking because I personally don't mind expending the three calories that it takes me to uh click through Amazon's purch not only do you not mind you like it because your Apple watch tells you that you've expended the three calories yes I need to I need to fill up those Rings bro I'm saying but what's what's going to happen here is that currently the the Apple interface for what it can understand and speak to are really restricted we know that Amazon's got a better vocabulary Google thinks they can do it best of everyone because they have everyone's information in the world on how we talk MH right how we construct sentences everything they think they've got it and they may well but where this is going to get interesting is when we start doing totally cool things like Commerce through it yeah were you were you as Blown Away not blown away but were you as impressed at Viv as I was I was pretty impressed tell me what impressed you about Viv uh just that it was able to parse natural language I mean obviously they it was tested before they went up upstage on stage to do it but it seems like it is much better at processing natural language and if they get the support connecting with um you know third party places like Uber or whatever which is much more towards the path that I thought Siri would be on at this point than what it is right Viv is cool I grant you and and it's all these things are all narrowing in on this same kind of thing which is when Mikey says I'm drunk get me a ride mhm gets me a ride well not only does it get you a ride it interprets what get you a ride means exactly and and not only interpret what get you a ride means it interprets and figures out where you need to be going at this time of night yep so when it's 3:00 a.m. and you've been out there on a bender right get me a ride means call me an Uber and take me home well that's just a normal Tuesday night for me well I'm I'm aware of that Siri should know that by now you'd think but you know when when I have six people over at my house and one of them says that they want pizza and one of them says that they want chicken wings and one of them says that they want chicken fingers and another one says that they want a salad and all this stuff and instead of the old way where you have to decide on a place and then figure out the menu and each pick from the menu and write down the notes and then call in the order or or in this Modern Age go to the website and click through and have it receive the order as a fax at the other end which is still horrible Antiquated and then they call you to check that the order was right in this Modern Age you should just be able to start calling out to the speaker calling out to Viv calling out to Ekko calling out to to Siri whatever saying what you want having it then figure out which place is going to be the one that can accommodate all of the requests place the order and it just comes or be really smart and order it from multiple places and send out a Tas rabbit or something to get it which would be cool yeah but the problem there is that everyone's food arrives at different time times no I mean you have uh well I guess you could have do you have like a service well you live in somewhere this big here we can just like order from multiple locations and they're fairly close to each other so one person one car will pick them up you live on an island dude I guess that's a benefit dude look bra you live on an island it's true what are we going to do with you it's making me hungry for pizza right now I'm saying yeah yeah but I know I'm looking forward to it and uh perhaps I I feel like in the near term the easiest way for Apple to integrate Siri is just to or get people to use it is just integrate it into every single one of their devices which they're kind of moving towards kind of almost there right I mean it's it's in the watch it's in the iPad it's in the phone it's in all the iOS devices it it's not in the Mac yet yeah so aside from uh when I have my phone near me I usually have some other electronic device turned on and near me or close enough in close enough proximity that I could you know potentially talk to it quote unquote I feel like there's a lot to like about Amazon's path of giving it to other developers to use MH mhm well that's never going to happen with apple though well why not if they if they make it a part of the homekit spec for example they already require you to buy a secure element chip that you know a secure chip that goes in all of the homekit devices so your Network's protected they could require you to throw in a mic and throw in this yeah I guess but a aside from licensing homekit you're going to have to pay an extra premium to get the components that Apple wants which would assumably be more you're already buying a chip from for for doing this but what are you going to need for Siri though uh you're going to need a mic and you've already got a network connection okay so your Bluetooth devices won't do it but your powered devices I've got hit devices that are Bluetooth and battery power maybe they won't do it but the uh the one the thermostat that's wired on the wall it should that should do it yeah yeah yeah the uh you know someday when they decide security cameras can be home enabled they got a mic already they should do it mhm the ceiling fan everything with the ceiling fan my voice is going to come out warbled from the fan moving around but still right yeah or you could uh the uh the the smoke detectors yeah or um did you ever get that First Alert smoke detector I sent you uh yes I did but I haven't set it up I have been having problems with my with my uh smoke detector uh wiring that connects all of them not sure what's wrong with it but it was triggering the alarm I had to take them all down I think the one I sent you is a battery powered you ought to try it out yeah well it's not that it's uh it's I don't know if you have this in your house but you know there's like the uh there's the grounds and then there's the live wire and then there's a third wire that is like a interconnect between all of the detectors in the house so if one goes off they all go off I don't have an integrated smoke detector wiring like that oh okay I mean i' I've wired AC powered ones before but that's just the two the two wires in a neutral yeah I think there's something maybe there's like a short or something and the you totally ought to try out that homekit one that I sent you is that the one that talks to me and tells me oh it it it um doesn't I didn't send you a nest I sent you a First Alert right but doesn't the First Alert one uh tell you um install it and figure it out come on man maybe I will it is hot I feel like I'm on fire right now well you are you're on fire all right so you wear your Apple watch I haven't been recently why um I don't know lack of usefulness I guess okay so the I read something interesting yes no this morning about how every other Fitness product out there uh yes is based around the step count right do you see this one no no but I I agree every every band right whether it's a Fitbit or a jawone or whatever is based around on the step count and this number this 10,000 step goal is an artificial number mhm that came about when the earliest pedometers came into existence yep it's a totally meaningless number but it sounds good because clearly you've had to do a decent amount of walking around during the day yeah okay however your actual active calories which is what the Apple watch is pushing for is a much better measurement right also much harder to Quant uh to quantify well yes but as the watch goes it's a much better thing because it's you're not just walking around casually during the day and reaching that 10,000 you're actively attempting to do something right right and that it's it's generally better for you more meaningful yeah and don't the uh don't the pedometers and like you know those fitbits and whatever don't they use a a generic uh a generic not a generic code but kind of like a same the the same platform I guess to calculate those steps uh as accelerometer isn't there like an open source kind of it's not open source but there's a uh a provider that's very proud that they are one of the leading providers for this kind of a product yeah which is weird because it basically makes all those products the same well where they differ is in their industrial design their battery life whether or not they have a display and the way the app works I would say the app is maybe the most important differentiator I I would agree and I would think that it's not just the app it's also whether the app is a silo and limited or if the app talks to all of the other things that are in in you know on the phone and usually the way I like to see things happen is through either Google fit or apple Health yeah apple health is is Apple health is good at fing information back and forth between other apps but as far as being a repository itself I think it's a bit lacking oh the dashboard for it's ghastly yeah because it doesn't help you draw any conclusions that's true they have they have uh what's his name from Nike well they have good old what's his name from Nike but they also uh posted that they're seeking a lawyer with HIPPA expertise for he Health initiatives indeed which suggests that they're finally ready to Sally Forth into that Brave New World of Health regulations yes you if they're going to have to deal with HIPPA it means that they're actively looking at things that are actually medically useful right it also I mean it also could me with research kit um a lot of the hippoc compliancy was on the shoulders of the devs which were basically research groups or universities or whatnot mhm um but I believe there were hippoc compliant studies that uh came out so this could be more of a software facing position uh but it does you prompt speculation that that's regulated by government bodies so I would you blood blood pressure monitoring for example stuff like that glucose maybe blood glucose levels all kinds of good stuff that would be very very already doing that all on your wrist right Pebble for a couple of years now has had ways to get glucose 24/7 monitoring onto the wrist oh yeah it's been pretty hacky I mean the initial attempts were very much Homebrew gross stuff but their latest thing they just launched a Kickstarter for is going to enable people to be able to do it with a whole lot less trouble so does it how what is it using to measure pictures and send them to you afterwards but uh it's it's pretty it's pretty slick what they're doing you know they've they've gone ahead and they they're putting heart rate into the watch instead of having it be the accessory band things like that but they are um they are doing it they are doing it well yeah so here's uh let's see diabetes data strapped to your wrist um yeah I'm going to have to send you this link so you can check it out it's pretty cool I guess Hippa thing kind of um I don't know it it could be obviously that they're working on something new but it could be that they're just trying to cover themselves for well the vision as we know it was always that the Apple watch was going to be a a real Health device mhm what an idea that they ditched at the last last moment because of uh regulatory issues or the regulatory hurdles that were first release temper that by saying for the first product release because you know you go down the path of developing the product you want to release at some point you have a date set in mind for your release yes Apple says to everyone publicly that they'll release when they're ready they won't release before that but come on we know that they have a release date in mind so they pushed out the first one it's going to live out there for a year or two they hire in this lawyer who's going to help them overcome the regulatory hurdles you see where I'm going yep so you think I mean obviously developing or attempting to develop something along the lines that was that were rumored previously as as far as being a holistic health monitoring uh platform and I I assume that they continued development even though they didn't bundle it with the first version I'm just saying second version is that you know all right that's what I'm saying you think they can uh achieve something like that by I don't know when do you think they're going to I I feel Rel watch this year next year I'd love to be surprised but I I feel like the watch is the kind of product where they put it out there they see how it does they see what people learn from it they don't want to go ahead and replace it right away because everyone who bought one in the first year is now going to feel like dirt well unless you bought a sport did you buy the sport too much of a investment guess all right then no yeah I grant you if you bought the addition that you don't mind replacing it right away I would rather money but clearly you have enough but if you bought the steel version you probably are going to be slightly my if they introduce a fresh one 6 months later right uh not only that but I would rather them I don't want this kind of Tik Tok cycle with an apple with like a wearable device I would rather them put decent like amount of effort into improvements that are significantly better than the previous version not just you know battery life hold on hold on hold on stop your performance I want new new hard the illustrious Mr Cole in Hong Kong told us that he goes out into the world wearing the Apple watch without his phone and that occasionally there's enough Wi-Fi around for his his watch to pick it up and get signal and and carry on and that he likes that that's enough for him right now I was making a bet with Neil and I made this I I talked with him about this in February that the Apple watch he said no way I told him it's going to get cellular connectivity in Q3 I said and he told me no way now if the watch gets sell your connectivity right if it gets LTE through a virtual Sim does that change things for you probably that would be enough of an internal buff I suppose but that's that's adding a completely new feature set right that makes it autonomous that makes it something that I don't that that makes it so it's basically a new device so that would be enough of a change those are the kinds of changes that I would like to see I would happily wait two three years for those kind of changes rather than minor updates that people are rumored you know that rumors are talking about like bettery battery life or or new materials I don't I don't care as an Apple Watch as a existing Apple watch owner it is really going to take a new serious feature that changes the behavior of the thing so more health information more Health Gathering more Health advice via the care kit and research kit kind of things putting in a a virtual Sim to keep it always online those are the kinds of things that change it for you would you go back to wearing it every day yep I don't know how they're going to oh yeah I would and I probably wouldn't carry my phone as much interesting cuz I carry my phone all the time yeah well I I don't really I wouldn't really need it for the quick runs to the store or whatever just have it all on my wrist should be which is kind of the you know what people wanted out of a or want out of a wearable device to begin with but well let's let's talk about the new phone I know we'll see if they can do it I don't know if they're going to this year I don't know we will see good luck with that not afraid to be wrong yeah got to put the beted out there all right apples uh if they want to they want to deliver I certainly hope so I'm sure they're listening I am going to be getting a new phone presumably sometime in September yeah so let me tell you about the phone that I want to get in September yeah the phone that I want to get in September is going to be large it's going to have a dual lens camera it's going to have a smart SMART connector and it's going to be the same thickness or1 mm thicker than the existing one so tell me more about those the schs I Le nothing you leak something no what' we publish no I didn't like anything uh we just wrote about the latest leaks quote unquote now that we're getting pretty close to when Apple should be starting to manufacture in mass quantities the iPhone 7 quote unquote again uh a lot of rumors are coming out from Apple suppliers a lot of leaks lot of a lot of schematics um and some are contradictory some are saying uh you know the 7's going to have the dual camera with a SMART connector some suggest that there is going to be no SMART connector so there's a lot of uh the back and forth floting around out there yep that is also now the latest schematics that we're talking abouted indicate that there is no headphone jack you don't really know of course I mean these could be schematics I do have to point out I did mock up a lightning to headphone adapter so it is possible mhm you know how I did this I didn't tell you about this I'm going to write an article about this for a site no I bought a lightning 2 HDMI adapter that is the Apple digital AV connector and then I bought a HDMI to VGA adapter that has a 3.5 audio out on it and when you go Lightning to HDMI HDMI to VGA with the headphone out as the audio and plug headphones in you have lightning to headphone out and it works awesome so it doesn't it's not blocked by um there's no uh chip that's necessary to or to that in the Apple digit connector if you're doing that that's true oh yeah I tried using um some lightning headphones exclusively and I I don't the problem with doing that adapter no no one should do this experiment I just did it to prove that I could but no one should actually do this because when you do this the volume controls are to disabled which makes sense because if you're plugging in to go to HDMI to go to projector or something you don't want to have volume in the way you want to just deliver the source at a proper level right but it functions so which which lightning audio headphones did you use how were they um the AI the OD e sign they sounded pretty good um had a couple issues with their uh software uh one issue where it started blaring a high pitch tone in my ears so there's that and um the this particular model has uh the the Dack and all the the guts built into the remote so the kind of why wouldn't they build them into the air cup don't um I'm not sure uh but they did it that way I think oh uh they did it because I believe this the sign also is um compatible with other formats not just lightning so I guess it' be easier them to swap out the remote module that's in line with the whatever cable that's going USB whatever C or whatever uh 3.5 mm Jack just switch out that one cable I guess it's a manufacturing consideration but I'm not sure in any case it's in the remote which makes it larger and kind of comical looking well I'm sorry to hear that it didn't quite work out for you um had it not been comical and had it not played a high-pitch squeal in your ear would it have been just fine yeah I mean it's a it's a pair of digital headphones with the onboard deck it didn't draw too much on my battery well actually I could yeah there there was a bit of draw on the battery obviously of my phone so that's also another consideration M to take into account if you're looking at uh lightning headphones all right well this has been another episode this is episode 70 can you believe it of the Apple Insider podcast Mikey where can people find you online at Mikey Campbell 81 on the Twitter and Apple insider.com excellent well if Mikey goes around throughout his day with a high pitched squeal in his ear from lightning headphones we'll tell you all about it next time on the Apple Insider podcast whatyou're listening to the Apple Insider podcast welcome to this week's all new episode 70 of the Apple Insider podcast I'm your host Victor marks and with me this week is Apple Insider editor Mikey Campbell sup guys Mikey I'm so glad you're here Neil's off this week and so we have you filling in slacker no kidding where is that guy when you need him all right he's probably at his apartment staring at a staring at the wall or something I don't know you mean he's not doing anything Incredible or fun uh nothing I know of well you know if he's really smart if he's really smart this Memorial Day weekend he'll go and he'll save up to 300 bucks off popular 13 and 15in MacBook Pros oh tell me more tell me more you can save up to $300 off when you pair instant discounts with exclusive coupons or you can snap up a 2015 12-in MacBook for only $964 with three free accessories free shipping and no sales tax in most US states so this week resellers Adorama B&H and Mac Mall combined to offer the lowest prices across the board on popular MacBooks like 13 and 15in MacBook Pros and are picked for the very best value the remaining 2015 12in MacBooks some include free items like a one-year low Jack subscription or Parallels Desktop 11 for Mac all ship free and many without sales tax so we've got a guide on our website go to appleinsider.com and you can go through our price guide and see which one is the deal for for you yeah I would argue that the uh that the uh price that they're selling the 12-in MacBook at now is what Apple should be selling it for and uh yeah it's just overpriced by a lot well to your mind uh I think to most people's mind I mean I know people are are going to buy it obviously it's a sexy machine but I I think it's overpriced I met a woman in the airport uh in Los Angeles about a month ago and she had the rose gold MacBook 12 in of course and she insisted because I I asked her how do you like it and she said that it was quite possibly the best machine that she'd ever owned it was thin it was light and as far as she could tell it was not underpowered M right so I asked her dutifully you know because I I want to report the truth to you dear listeners I asked what do you use it for and she said that she has Safari tabs open all the time she has like 20 tabs open she has Excel spreadsheets going on in uh the the 2016 Microsoft Office for Mac and she does her whole business she is the owner of her company and she runs her whole business out of this 12-in MacBook spreadsheets in uh web browsing power user material you say I know she's not doing Final Cut Pro but for for she said that if she ever you know when she hired new employees this was the machine she was going to issue them F finica Pro wait do when that when you install that or you try to install that on a MacBook does it just have a pop-up window that says no no I I think it probably allows you to do it but she she insisted that this was great and her business is something about um it's in the Pharma space somewhere she's she's I believe a distributor of pharmaceuticals legitimate ones but uh she's that's what she's using this machine for and she was going to issue them to all of her new employees because she felt it was a fantastic machine for the price cool to each his own I suppose yes well you know she's going to run into trouble at the end of this year isn't she she is well if she doesn't if she doesn't need the PowerHouse then uh then I guess she's okay but for people like uh you and I you know we're uh Road Warriors who don't go on the road I suppose well I'm on the road every month okay well I stay at home all the time so for me uh our favorite analyst Ming Cho he a crowd favorite of course all hail yep he's uh his latest hot off the press bit is so so what does his crystal ball say when he looks deeply into it he's looking into his crystal balls he's uh he's saying that uh Apple's going to release a new slim down 13 and 15in MacBook Pro finally so it's going to be the redesign that everyone's been rumored rumoring rumor mongering about for the past I don't know two years it seems and uh it's going to come with a bunch of pretty crazy crazy componentry if you believe Mr quo okay so so what will this supposed and this is the Q4 rumor this says that that Apple's expected to drastically revamp its Flagship line in the second half of 2016 around the fourth quarter yeah so probably hopefully I'm guessing they're shooting for the holiday season of course but who knows it could come after and this this thing is going to come with Touch ID it is indeed so along with the thin and redesigned form factor it's going to have some sort of touch ID authentication and perhaps not touch ID itself but maybe so um I wish it would yeah so I mean it's going to be something along those lines it's going to also have uh is going to replace the function buttons at the top of the keyboard with a OLED display touch bar for which is kind of cool uh you some you know you know the old IBM thinkpads used to have a little display at the top yeah so this is going to be like an advanced version of that or anything that I mean it's it's cool because um right now you have to you know switch between uh the function keys serve more than one one purpose of course right well they're the F keys and they're also the the screen brightness and so forth and and you know playback and volumes right so I in this case OSX uh OS 10 could um dynamically change that for you use maybe I don't know just just spitballing here but it could dynamically change it between those two or maybe you can even configure your own stuff like uh like the uh uh what is that the the Optimus keyboard from oh right the the keyboard that had oleds in all the keys kind of thing yeah so it could be kind of like that like a roll your own kind of solution which would be cool but I don't think that Apple would give you that much uh leeway as far as customization is concerned but uh aside from that uh usual expansions um uh on the port so USBC going to be carried over from is that going to be the charge port or is that going to be in addition to a MAG safe unclear I don't know if USBC can well depending on the battery oh although he did quote did say that they're bringing over the uh the battery design from the MacBook as well not specifically the rated output but that kind of you know um layered design the multi-tier thing the the Stacked battery that uses all of the available physical space inside the enclosure exactly right so they're going to bring that over um but I don't know if it he didn't really say if there if USBC is going to be used as a a charging thing I don't think it will um just considering that there's ample space on the uh uh logic board and all that good stuff and there's space on the CH be used for more battery uh yeah but I mean Apple's going to they're going to if I mean if if it's a MacBook Pro you're going to expect a certain level of performance and I don't think that they can squeeze that out of a logic board that's the size of the one in the the uh MacBook which is almost like an iOS device in itself so um so I would I would I would not bet on mag safe going away much to the uh much to the happiness of Mr Neil Hughes who uh cannot get enough of the mag safe yeah um and also Thunderbolt three but I don't know exactly he said uh there's going to be Thunderbolt 3 ports but uh considering that Thunderbolt 3 uh also supports the um you know the same form factor as USBC right it uses the same connector so I mean I don't know guess just they could save space by just slapping in like three uh generic looking USBC SL Thunderbolt 3 ports um I don't know if they would actually break it out you know you know how they do now right USB and then Thunderbolt 2 are two separ right but it's an entirely different connector it's using the old uh mini display port micro display port kind of connector right so um yeah so I mean those are the major major things probably get the the usual processor bumps um probably I I would I would guess that we're not going to see huge performance increases probably going to be along the same lines as usual that's what happens when Apple changes the form factor right it it doesn't make the it's the version that follows that really grows the uh so right now they're kind of shooting for as good or slightly better than current performance specs uh in an all new design which would be the major selling point here yeah well I want Touch ID yeah Touch ID is uh cool if they can implement it correctly not just because I want to be able to unlock my laptop with a touch no I I want it I want all of the online purchases yeah that would be cool they launched it and they launched Apple pay for the web at the same time well they're kind of is Apple pay for the web if you use stripe as your processor yeah okay yeah that's true that's true because that's how you know that's how Lyft and Uber are all doing it is they're using stripe as the processor so that you can just do Apple pay within the app like that but well yeah I mean inapp obviously has purchasing but how many web pages are integrating that into their payment uh backbone um not enough because they're all using PayPal at this time yeah or a few of them using Amazon payments damn you Elon Musk but I you know my my end game my end goal here is that Apple pay replaces PayPal for everything for for person to person for for everything I mean that would be I think an obvious I mean obviously they're going for something like that right but you certainly hope so they definitely have the support customer consumer support to throw their weight around a bit um I don't know I don't know I mean it's a good it's a good system I I like it but it's just not offered in the places that I frequent I used it for uh let's see one two I used it for four different transactions today congratulations I used it for one transaction this past uh quarter now I used it at a medical doctor I used it at an eye doctor I used it at a dentist I used it at Walgreens and I used it at the grocery store Food Lion where five transactions Food Food Lion a Food Lion I used it at uh Walgreens Y and that was only because they're the only store that was open that's because you wanted to experiment and see that it worked um kind of the the register or the cashier was not uh not amused by my by here's another dork fiddling with his phone yeah yeah she didn't she didn't seem as happy as I was that it worked well I know you were Overjoyed yeah that's not the only I I got to get back to this cuz you know that's not the only MacBook that's going to launch this here we we that's we're talking about the Prine changes in Q4 right so supposedly there's I I took out my good old my reliable 2015 MacBook Air uhhuh what a champ that thing is well guess what there might not be anymore come darn in 2017 so as some people have theorized quo is saying that Apple's going to just go Whole Hog on the MacBook line and make that the uh Flagship thin and light and I guess for in the near term relegate the air series to the budget model so they're kind of flip-flopping remember when uh remember when uh they had the polycarbonate MacBook was the uh was a budget and then the white MacBook yeah and black book if you had the one year that they did Black right the yeah and then they did education for one year and then they phased it out completely so it's kind of uh they're they're kind of switching places uh the air has been surpassed in thin design by the MacBook um it also has a better screen right the MacBook does better trackpad better trackpad so better everything and uh the writing's kind of been on the wall that Apple's you know slowing down development of the air lineup going to replace it with the MacBook uh but quo is saying I don't know about this rumor because it it's saying he's saying that Apple's going to launch a 13in model and before the MacBook Pros this year so um quarter three I believe he said so clarify this for me we're not going to get a 13-inch MacBook Air we're going to get a 13-in version of the 12-in version yes and is that dumb um it's in interesting uh I mean what do you get more battery a slightly bigger screen I mean it's just a 1-inch diagonal but it is uh to your eyes probably a noticeable difference I guess but um it could give them a little a bit more space to play with uh internal components like um perhaps a slightly beefier processor or uh or more onboard Ram soldered on of course it gives them a little more head SP uh um a little more uh free space to play with right inside the chassis I mean the logic board of the 12in is about the same size as Raspberry Pi at this time mhm yeah yeah and if they grow it by diagonal 1 in okay so maybe they gain uh you know a quarter inch or so on each well a little more than that length well I mean we have to assume that they're going to I mean that extra bit could be um used for a cellular antenna well there's nothing stopping them as you say from from doing a virtual Sim and having the carriers sell service so I mean there has to be something more than just having an extra inch of Retina Display to differentiate the two models I don't think Apple would uh come out with the MacBook you know 13 and just have it be slightly larger than the 12 there has to be something else unfortunately the MacBook Pro moniker is taken so they can't Market it as a stepup model um they just maybe maybe the MacBook 4G oh I doubt they do that one can hope there are rumors that you know they're going to they're getting close to uh making everyone's dreams come true well speaking of dreams come true true you know we we've been talking a little bit these past couple of episodes about voice first and and in some cases we' been talking about that in terms of payments and other things about the interface and how Apple TV has Siri but it doesn't really act like a voice first device currently yeah no right and we saw that at Google IO they announced Google announced the Google home their voice first product so their next failure well I don't know about failure as much as the next thing they'll cancel because was too popular they canceled it they've done that before mhm uh okay so it looks as if Apple so Apple bought vocal IQ yes right yes and what was vocal IQ good for what were they what were they about uh well they were a uh uh so kind of a a voice recognition speech recognition company focusing on um cellular right the cellular Market what what was interesting about them is that their technology as I understand it is is one that was able to establish connections between pieces of information so it could actually kind of build its knowledge base and learn over time right and that it's pretty powerful indeed that that instead of having to teach you know instead of having Apple have to teach everything on its back end that it can amass its knowledge base and and grow itself over time and make these connections now sometimes that can go horribly horribly wrong as Microsoft saw with their Twitter bot T it took all of what 48 hours for I think it was less than that wasn't it 24 hours I I think it was like within a few hours I thought I don't know so what happened with Tay um uh basically the uh enterprising internet people taught it to be a racist sexist horrible Internet troll yeah through there so it started out as a subtle teenage personality twitterbot turned into a supremacist overnight although one can argue that Microsoft was uh very successful in its goal right it accomplished its goal it well it I mean it it it accomplished part of its goal it was taught Tay was taught to mimic the behavior of its contemporaries which are basically internet trolls on Twitter bad yeah so so the idea is that Apple bought vocal IQ and is going to take Apple TV and turn it into a Siri based Echo competitor that instead of making a standalone speaker which they could do but they don't want to do they want the Apple TV to be the Hub of everything and so they can simply put on the always on mic and you know use the set top speaker yeah and and go that route yeah uh there's a few snags right that they can run into I mean people the snags well people have been saying I mean they've don't tell me the snags oh uh I'll tell you the snags God tell me the snags so besides the fact they have to update the form factor uh to include something something like a speaker or something well they can use the TV speaker they don't need you always keep your TV on right the beauty of the echo is that it's a standalone device that operates outside of other systems well they don't have to incorporate a speaker they could do it like the dot the Amazon dot you use Bluetooth or ax to pair it to speakers well I guess but who's going to do that well if if Apple TV pairs with a speaker then do it uh I don't know I think I don't know if they would anyway it currently does airplay speaker you can use any airpl speaker you want right but I mean that's reliant on in any case also where are you going to where you going to put it right now my Apple TV I can't see it because it I don't need line of sight because of the Bluetooth Street remote mode so a lot of people hide their stuff in like a cabinet or something which is kind of precludes the whole uh always present Siri anyway so so they're going to make this thing I don't know if they're going to make it I doubt it you don't think so I don't think that they would include um I don't think that they would make an Apple TV an echol like device if they wanted to do that they would have to make a separate device I don't think they would build it into Apple TV maybe I mean people hide stuff right A lot of the time these days I mean you don't keep your component less than you think I don't know anyone who keeps their stuff out uh I know most people that do so go figure anyway yeah I don't I don't know if they're going to do it just because uh there's a lot of hurdles right to get through as far as I think it would do better as a standalone don't you what do some people want that Siri experience but they don't care about streaming content or this is the thing about the way Amazon's gone about it right Amazon's approach has been to build a couple of different products that incorporated to release the code on GitHub that allows anyone to use a Raspberry Pi to create their own Amazon Echo device which doesn't have always you have to wire in a button on the gpio on the Raspberry Pi to initiate it so the same way as using the Siri remote on the Apple tv4 but they're encouraging third parties like Trilby which is the refrigerator magnet whiteboard to be Amazon Echo enabled there is an Indiegogo I saw today that is simply a button with a mic so that you can cheaply place button and mics all around there's a wristwatch that was on one of the kicks on the crowdfunders that has uh has Amazon Echo built into it yeah I mean those are all neat NE IDE Amazon wants everyone to build it into all of their products so that it just works of course they do and what you're going to end up with are products that are compatible with both Amazon Echo and homekit right over time over it's already happening any time no it's already happening it is slowly yeah so what what you're getting at is the notion that Apple's going to go ahead and give third party developers an SDK through which they can interface with Siri right which they've already kind of started doing that a little bit in the Apple TV 4 where they allow you to to allow Siri to index your app so that you can give voice instructions to Apple TV yeah but that's just like a few instruction sets it's very it's comparatively weak sauce right but I mean yeah if you do open up that API depending on what apis they you know are included in the SDK that would be uh that' be pretty powerful right I mean it would expand Siri I don't know unlimited perhaps depending on how much Freedom they give developers which would be interesting I don't know do you think they're playing catchup with other people at this point you feel I don't I I mean from a consumer's perspective seeing that Amazon's got this thing out there and Google already showed it and apple hasn't shown anything the consumer is going to say yeah apples on the back foot playing catchup what you don't know is that they they have vocal IQ they have that team on board they have the knowledge they need to pull this off yeah I was kind of underwhelmed at the uh Siri improvements this past iOS 9 well I don't I don't use them as much as I I think Apple would like me to use them Siri most people use Siri for starting timers in the kitchen which is coincidentally this the same use that is the biggest use of of the Amazon Echo and the only difference is that with the Amazon Echo you don't have to touch your phone to do it and apple could over and all the Amazon Echo heads all the fans of echo tout that as being being so awesome that you don't have to touch your phone and and they're all stupid because and I'm going to get tons of email from Amazon Echo fans but but it's ridiculous because all Apple has to do is turn on always on hey Siri and it doesn't matter that it's your phone or a speaker it's done right you still have the handsfree use mhm so so this is not a big hurdle but that's one of the features that the Amazon echoe heads totally love is that they can start a kitchen timer and not have to grab for their phone or they can add to the shopping list without having to grab for their phone great Apple turns on Hy Siri and it's done right always on H Siri and it's the same thing I'm waiting for something groundbreaking because I personally don't mind expending the three calories that it takes me to uh click through Amazon's purch not only do you not mind you like it because your Apple watch tells you that you've expended the three calories yes I need to I need to fill up those Rings bro I'm saying but what's what's going to happen here is that currently the the Apple interface for what it can understand and speak to are really restricted we know that Amazon's got a better vocabulary Google thinks they can do it best of everyone because they have everyone's information in the world on how we talk MH right how we construct sentences everything they think they've got it and they may well but where this is going to get interesting is when we start doing totally cool things like Commerce through it yeah were you were you as Blown Away not blown away but were you as impressed at Viv as I was I was pretty impressed tell me what impressed you about Viv uh just that it was able to parse natural language I mean obviously they it was tested before they went up upstage on stage to do it but it seems like it is much better at processing natural language and if they get the support connecting with um you know third party places like Uber or whatever which is much more towards the path that I thought Siri would be on at this point than what it is right Viv is cool I grant you and and it's all these things are all narrowing in on this same kind of thing which is when Mikey says I'm drunk get me a ride mhm gets me a ride well not only does it get you a ride it interprets what get you a ride means exactly and and not only interpret what get you a ride means it interprets and figures out where you need to be going at this time of night yep so when it's 3:00 a.m. and you've been out there on a bender right get me a ride means call me an Uber and take me home well that's just a normal Tuesday night for me well I'm I'm aware of that Siri should know that by now you'd think but you know when when I have six people over at my house and one of them says that they want pizza and one of them says that they want chicken wings and one of them says that they want chicken fingers and another one says that they want a salad and all this stuff and instead of the old way where you have to decide on a place and then figure out the menu and each pick from the menu and write down the notes and then call in the order or or in this Modern Age go to the website and click through and have it receive the order as a fax at the other end which is still horrible Antiquated and then they call you to check that the order was right in this Modern Age you should just be able to start calling out to the speaker calling out to Viv calling out to Ekko calling out to to Siri whatever saying what you want having it then figure out which place is going to be the one that can accommodate all of the requests place the order and it just comes or be really smart and order it from multiple places and send out a Tas rabbit or something to get it which would be cool yeah but the problem there is that everyone's food arrives at different time times no I mean you have uh well I guess you could have do you have like a service well you live in somewhere this big here we can just like order from multiple locations and they're fairly close to each other so one person one car will pick them up you live on an island dude I guess that's a benefit dude look bra you live on an island it's true what are we going to do with you it's making me hungry for pizza right now I'm saying yeah yeah but I know I'm looking forward to it and uh perhaps I I feel like in the near term the easiest way for Apple to integrate Siri is just to or get people to use it is just integrate it into every single one of their devices which they're kind of moving towards kind of almost there right I mean it's it's in the watch it's in the iPad it's in the phone it's in all the iOS devices it it's not in the Mac yet yeah so aside from uh when I have my phone near me I usually have some other electronic device turned on and near me or close enough in close enough proximity that I could you know potentially talk to it quote unquote I feel like there's a lot to like about Amazon's path of giving it to other developers to use MH mhm well that's never going to happen with apple though well why not if they if they make it a part of the homekit spec for example they already require you to buy a secure element chip that you know a secure chip that goes in all of the homekit devices so your Network's protected they could require you to throw in a mic and throw in this yeah I guess but a aside from licensing homekit you're going to have to pay an extra premium to get the components that Apple wants which would assumably be more you're already buying a chip from for for doing this but what are you going to need for Siri though uh you're going to need a mic and you've already got a network connection okay so your Bluetooth devices won't do it but your powered devices I've got hit devices that are Bluetooth and battery power maybe they won't do it but the uh the one the thermostat that's wired on the wall it should that should do it yeah yeah yeah the uh you know someday when they decide security cameras can be home enabled they got a mic already they should do it mhm the ceiling fan everything with the ceiling fan my voice is going to come out warbled from the fan moving around but still right yeah or you could uh the uh the the smoke detectors yeah or um did you ever get that First Alert smoke detector I sent you uh yes I did but I haven't set it up I have been having problems with my with my uh smoke detector uh wiring that connects all of them not sure what's wrong with it but it was triggering the alarm I had to take them all down I think the one I sent you is a battery powered you ought to try it out yeah well it's not that it's uh it's I don't know if you have this in your house but you know there's like the uh there's the grounds and then there's the live wire and then there's a third wire that is like a interconnect between all of the detectors in the house so if one goes off they all go off I don't have an integrated smoke detector wiring like that oh okay I mean i' I've wired AC powered ones before but that's just the two the two wires in a neutral yeah I think there's something maybe there's like a short or something and the you totally ought to try out that homekit one that I sent you is that the one that talks to me and tells me oh it it it um doesn't I didn't send you a nest I sent you a First Alert right but doesn't the First Alert one uh tell you um install it and figure it out come on man maybe I will it is hot I feel like I'm on fire right now well you are you're on fire all right so you wear your Apple watch I haven't been recently why um I don't know lack of usefulness I guess okay so the I read something interesting yes no this morning about how every other Fitness product out there uh yes is based around the step count right do you see this one no no but I I agree every every band right whether it's a Fitbit or a jawone or whatever is based around on the step count and this number this 10,000 step goal is an artificial number mhm that came about when the earliest pedometers came into existence yep it's a totally meaningless number but it sounds good because clearly you've had to do a decent amount of walking around during the day yeah okay however your actual active calories which is what the Apple watch is pushing for is a much better measurement right also much harder to Quant uh to quantify well yes but as the watch goes it's a much better thing because it's you're not just walking around casually during the day and reaching that 10,000 you're actively attempting to do something right right and that it's it's generally better for you more meaningful yeah and don't the uh don't the pedometers and like you know those fitbits and whatever don't they use a a generic uh a generic not a generic code but kind of like a same the the same platform I guess to calculate those steps uh as accelerometer isn't there like an open source kind of it's not open source but there's a uh a provider that's very proud that they are one of the leading providers for this kind of a product yeah which is weird because it basically makes all those products the same well where they differ is in their industrial design their battery life whether or not they have a display and the way the app works I would say the app is maybe the most important differentiator I I would agree and I would think that it's not just the app it's also whether the app is a silo and limited or if the app talks to all of the other things that are in in you know on the phone and usually the way I like to see things happen is through either Google fit or apple Health yeah apple health is is Apple health is good at fing information back and forth between other apps but as far as being a repository itself I think it's a bit lacking oh the dashboard for it's ghastly yeah because it doesn't help you draw any conclusions that's true they have they have uh what's his name from Nike well they have good old what's his name from Nike but they also uh posted that they're seeking a lawyer with HIPPA expertise for he Health initiatives indeed which suggests that they're finally ready to Sally Forth into that Brave New World of Health regulations yes you if they're going to have to deal with HIPPA it means that they're actively looking at things that are actually medically useful right it also I mean it also could me with research kit um a lot of the hippoc compliancy was on the shoulders of the devs which were basically research groups or universities or whatnot mhm um but I believe there were hippoc compliant studies that uh came out so this could be more of a software facing position uh but it does you prompt speculation that that's regulated by government bodies so I would you blood blood pressure monitoring for example stuff like that glucose maybe blood glucose levels all kinds of good stuff that would be very very already doing that all on your wrist right Pebble for a couple of years now has had ways to get glucose 24/7 monitoring onto the wrist oh yeah it's been pretty hacky I mean the initial attempts were very much Homebrew gross stuff but their latest thing they just launched a Kickstarter for is going to enable people to be able to do it with a whole lot less trouble so does it how what is it using to measure pictures and send them to you afterwards but uh it's it's pretty it's pretty slick what they're doing you know they've they've gone ahead and they they're putting heart rate into the watch instead of having it be the accessory band things like that but they are um they are doing it they are doing it well yeah so here's uh let's see diabetes data strapped to your wrist um yeah I'm going to have to send you this link so you can check it out it's pretty cool I guess Hippa thing kind of um I don't know it it could be obviously that they're working on something new but it could be that they're just trying to cover themselves for well the vision as we know it was always that the Apple watch was going to be a a real Health device mhm what an idea that they ditched at the last last moment because of uh regulatory issues or the regulatory hurdles that were first release temper that by saying for the first product release because you know you go down the path of developing the product you want to release at some point you have a date set in mind for your release yes Apple says to everyone publicly that they'll release when they're ready they won't release before that but come on we know that they have a release date in mind so they pushed out the first one it's going to live out there for a year or two they hire in this lawyer who's going to help them overcome the regulatory hurdles you see where I'm going yep so you think I mean obviously developing or attempting to develop something along the lines that was that were rumored previously as as far as being a holistic health monitoring uh platform and I I assume that they continued development even though they didn't bundle it with the first version I'm just saying second version is that you know all right that's what I'm saying you think they can uh achieve something like that by I don't know when do you think they're going to I I feel Rel watch this year next year I'd love to be surprised but I I feel like the watch is the kind of product where they put it out there they see how it does they see what people learn from it they don't want to go ahead and replace it right away because everyone who bought one in the first year is now going to feel like dirt well unless you bought a sport did you buy the sport too much of a investment guess all right then no yeah I grant you if you bought the addition that you don't mind replacing it right away I would rather money but clearly you have enough but if you bought the steel version you probably are going to be slightly my if they introduce a fresh one 6 months later right uh not only that but I would rather them I don't want this kind of Tik Tok cycle with an apple with like a wearable device I would rather them put decent like amount of effort into improvements that are significantly better than the previous version not just you know battery life hold on hold on hold on stop your performance I want new new hard the illustrious Mr Cole in Hong Kong told us that he goes out into the world wearing the Apple watch without his phone and that occasionally there's enough Wi-Fi around for his his watch to pick it up and get signal and and carry on and that he likes that that's enough for him right now I was making a bet with Neil and I made this I I talked with him about this in February that the Apple watch he said no way I told him it's going to get cellular connectivity in Q3 I said and he told me no way now if the watch gets sell your connectivity right if it gets LTE through a virtual Sim does that change things for you probably that would be enough of an internal buff I suppose but that's that's adding a completely new feature set right that makes it autonomous that makes it something that I don't that that makes it so it's basically a new device so that would be enough of a change those are the kinds of changes that I would like to see I would happily wait two three years for those kind of changes rather than minor updates that people are rumored you know that rumors are talking about like bettery battery life or or new materials I don't I don't care as an Apple Watch as a existing Apple watch owner it is really going to take a new serious feature that changes the behavior of the thing so more health information more Health Gathering more Health advice via the care kit and research kit kind of things putting in a a virtual Sim to keep it always online those are the kinds of things that change it for you would you go back to wearing it every day yep I don't know how they're going to oh yeah I would and I probably wouldn't carry my phone as much interesting cuz I carry my phone all the time yeah well I I don't really I wouldn't really need it for the quick runs to the store or whatever just have it all on my wrist should be which is kind of the you know what people wanted out of a or want out of a wearable device to begin with but well let's let's talk about the new phone I know we'll see if they can do it I don't know if they're going to this year I don't know we will see good luck with that not afraid to be wrong yeah got to put the beted out there all right apples uh if they want to they want to deliver I certainly hope so I'm sure they're listening I am going to be getting a new phone presumably sometime in September yeah so let me tell you about the phone that I want to get in September yeah the phone that I want to get in September is going to be large it's going to have a dual lens camera it's going to have a smart SMART connector and it's going to be the same thickness or1 mm thicker than the existing one so tell me more about those the schs I Le nothing you leak something no what' we publish no I didn't like anything uh we just wrote about the latest leaks quote unquote now that we're getting pretty close to when Apple should be starting to manufacture in mass quantities the iPhone 7 quote unquote again uh a lot of rumors are coming out from Apple suppliers a lot of leaks lot of a lot of schematics um and some are contradictory some are saying uh you know the 7's going to have the dual camera with a SMART connector some suggest that there is going to be no SMART connector so there's a lot of uh the back and forth floting around out there yep that is also now the latest schematics that we're talking abouted indicate that there is no headphone jack you don't really know of course I mean these could be schematics I do have to point out I did mock up a lightning to headphone adapter so it is possible mhm you know how I did this I didn't tell you about this I'm going to write an article about this for a site no I bought a lightning 2 HDMI adapter that is the Apple digital AV connector and then I bought a HDMI to VGA adapter that has a 3.5 audio out on it and when you go Lightning to HDMI HDMI to VGA with the headphone out as the audio and plug headphones in you have lightning to headphone out and it works awesome so it doesn't it's not blocked by um there's no uh chip that's necessary to or to that in the Apple digit connector if you're doing that that's true oh yeah I tried using um some lightning headphones exclusively and I I don't the problem with doing that adapter no no one should do this experiment I just did it to prove that I could but no one should actually do this because when you do this the volume controls are to disabled which makes sense because if you're plugging in to go to HDMI to go to projector or something you don't want to have volume in the way you want to just deliver the source at a proper level right but it functions so which which lightning audio headphones did you use how were they um the AI the OD e sign they sounded pretty good um had a couple issues with their uh software uh one issue where it started blaring a high pitch tone in my ears so there's that and um the this particular model has uh the the Dack and all the the guts built into the remote so the kind of why wouldn't they build them into the air cup don't um I'm not sure uh but they did it that way I think oh uh they did it because I believe this the sign also is um compatible with other formats not just lightning so I guess it' be easier them to swap out the remote module that's in line with the whatever cable that's going USB whatever C or whatever uh 3.5 mm Jack just switch out that one cable I guess it's a manufacturing consideration but I'm not sure in any case it's in the remote which makes it larger and kind of comical looking well I'm sorry to hear that it didn't quite work out for you um had it not been comical and had it not played a high-pitch squeal in your ear would it have been just fine yeah I mean it's a it's a pair of digital headphones with the onboard deck it didn't draw too much on my battery well actually I could yeah there there was a bit of draw on the battery obviously of my phone so that's also another consideration M to take into account if you're looking at uh lightning headphones all right well this has been another episode this is episode 70 can you believe it of the Apple Insider podcast Mikey where can people find you online at Mikey Campbell 81 on the Twitter and Apple insider.com excellent well if Mikey goes around throughout his day with a high pitched squeal in his ear from lightning headphones we'll tell you all about it next time on the Apple Insider podcast what\n"