Shazam, OneDrive, Porsche, FIFA 15, ESPN, JetBlue and More Apps Updated for Apple Watch

A number of notable apps have been updated with Apple Watch support to start off the week, including Shazam, Microsoft OneDrive, Porsche Car Connect, FIFA 15 Ultimate Team by EA SPORTS, Epicurious, Nick Jr, ESPN, Avea, JetBlue and Letterpad. The updates should be rolling out on the App Store today prior to the Apple Watch launch on April 24.

Shazam for Apple Watch will enable you to discover which artist, song and lyrics you are listening to from your wrist in seconds. You will also be able to see your past Shazams at a Glance with a simple swipe up gesture, turn on Auto Shazam to continue discovering music automatically and use Handoff on Apple Watch and iPhone to buy songs on iTunes, watch videos and more. Shazam is free on the App Store.

Microsoft recently released an update for the OneDrive app to view your photos and albums stored on the cloud storage service on an Apple Watch. You can view your most recent photos, delete photos you don't want to keep, find photos by tag and view your albums directly from your wrist using the latest version of the app. OneDrive is free on the App Store with tiered storage plans available.

Porsche Car Connect for Apple Watch (Image: WatchAware)
Porsche Car Connect has been updated to allow remote display and control of your Porsche from an Apple Watch. The app, compatible with select 2014 models and later, provides safety notifications, journey statistics, vehicle status and a vehicle locator directly on the Apple Watch. Porsche Car Connect is free on the App Store and available for the new Panamera, 918 Spyder, Macan and Cayenne.

EA Sports has introduced new Apple Watch features for FIFA 15 Ultimate Team that help you assemble and manage the ultimate soccer team from your wrist. FIFA 15 Ultimate Team for Apple Watch lets you manage your top five player transfers and get instant game-related notifications. FIFA 15 Ultimate Team by EA SPORTS is free on the App Store with in-app purchases available.

Epicurious has introduced its smart kitchen timer app for Apple Watch. The app lets you choose from 40-plus ingredients from one of five categories — steak, vegetables, chicken and pork, seafood, and eggs — and the custom timer will tell you how long the food takes to cook. Epicurious will also give you cooking-related reminders and tips. The app is free on the App Store.


Nickelodeon updated Nick Jr. for the Apple Watch over the weekend, allowing iPhone users to manage their child's Nick Jr. screen time through a Bluetooth connection right from the watch. Nick Jr. is free on the App Store and features full TV episodes, videos and iconic Nickelodeon characters on the iOS version.


ESPN updated its universal iOS app with Apple Watch support today, providing fans of the NFL, MLB, NBA, NHL, NCAA, Nascar and other sports and leagues with real-time notifications on scoring plays and breaking news on the wrist. Apple originally listed ESPN as one of its featured Apple Watch apps on its website last month. ESPN is free on the App Store.

Elgato today launched one of the first Apple Watch apps that can control a piece of hardware. The updated version of the Avea app is built for Apple Watch and allows users to pick their favorite dynamic light moods right from their wrists. Elgato Avea is free on the App Store.

By raising your wrist you can see which Avea light mood is currently on. Tap the Glance to switch to the selection menu of scenes and solid colors. By applying a Force Touch, users can bring up a scene's settings. You can even program Avea's Wake-Up light directly on Apple Watch.

JetBlue also became the latest airline to update their app with Apple Watch support, alongside American Airlines, Delta, British Airways, Air Canada, WestJet, Qantas Airways, Ryanair and several others. JetBlue for Apple Watch provides flyers with flight statuses in Glances, travel countdowns and access to their smart mobile boarding pass on the wrist. JetBlue is free on the App Store.


As reported by our sister website TouchArcade this morning, game developer NimbleBit has released Letterpad with Apple Watch support. The word game consists of forming words relating to a particular topic from a set of 9 letter tiles, and allows you to use hints that reveal a letter of one of the words you're trying to find among the tiles. Letterpad is free on the App Store.

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Posted in 2015 at 06:39PM, April 20

Benchmarks Confirm New MacBook Air Brings Decent Speed Improvements, MacBook Pro Less So

Earlier this week, we shared some Geekbench benchmarks for the Broadwell processors in the new 13-inch Retina MacBook Pro and the new 13-inch MacBook Air, which pointed towards speeds that were comparable to mid-2014 models.



At the time, we noted the results might shift once more data came in and the machines got past their initial housekeeping tasks, and Primate Labs' John Poole has now shared additional benchmarks for all stock versions of the new machines. The new data indicate that performance improvements may indeed be somewhat better than initially thought, though still relatively moderate.



On the new MacBook Air, both the default 1.6 GHz Core i5 chip and the 2.2 GHz Core i7 chip available as an upgrade performed somewhat better than their predecessors on the 32-bit single-core test, but there were more significant gains in the multi-core test for the higher-end processors.





According to the new averages, single-core performance increased 6 percent from Haswell to Broadwell. Multi-core performance on the i5 chip increased 7 percent, while multi-core performance for the i7 model increased 14 percent.



Due to the more meaningful jump in multi-core performance between the 2.2GHz Core i7 chip and the 1.6GHz Core i5 chip, Poole recommends that MacBook Air buyers go for the processor upgrade.

If you're thinking of buying the new MacBook Air I would strongly recommend the i7 processor. It has 20% faster single-core performance and 25% faster multi-core performance for only a 15% increase in price.

Benchmarks of the new 13-inch MacBook Pro showed slight gains over previous-generation models, but the differences were not quite as pronounced as on the MacBook Air. Single-core performance increased between 3 percent and 7 percent from Haswell to Broadwell, depending on the model, while multi-core performance increased 3 percent to 6 percent.

I have no recommendations regarding the processor for the new MacBook Pro. The performance differences and the price differences between the processors are roughly equivalent.

Intel operates on a "Tick-Tock" chip manufacturing model. Tock upgrades represent a new microarchitecture, while tick upgrades like Broadwell are generally an improvement on tock architecture, leading to improvements in efficiency. As a tick upgrade, the minor speed improvements Broadwell brings are no surprise. Intel's last tock upgrade was Haswell, and its next tock upgrade will be Skylake, coming later this year.



Apple's new 13-inch Retina MacBook Pro and new MacBook Air models are available immediately from the online Apple Store and from Apple's retail stores.

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Posted in 2015 at 06:39PM, March 13