Apple Upgrades China App Store for Faster Downloading

Randy Cheung, Mar 19, 2013 1:36 PM, 824 views, 1 Comment »,

China is Apple’s second biggest regional market by revenue behind the US. But Chinese Apple user always has a painful experience on downloading apps from Apple’s App Store. The connection in China is slow, it could take more than 10 minutes to get a simple app like FlipBoard to be downloaded. And it is one of the main reasons for Chinese people desperately need jailbreaking for their iPhone and iPad to go for local third-party App Store. Now the download speed in Apple’s online store in China has jumped 10 times through a recent network infrastructure upgrade. Apple used CDN (Content Delivery Network) to upgrade their network, which allowed Chinese users have a much higher download speed. CDN is usually deployed in multiple locations, often over multiple backbones. Benefits include reducing bandwidth costs, improving page load times, or increasing global availability of content. The latest upgrade helped Apple to improve the services of the iOS system in China in order to compete with the Android. The enhance of Chinese input method in iOS should be the next upgrade.

The Inside Story of China’s State Broadcaster in Smear Campaign Against Apple (Video)

Star Chang, Mar 19, 2013 4:56 AM, 2,587 views, 2 Comments »,

[UPDATE] Apple was accused of jerking Chinese consumers around in a 3-hour expose aired by China Central Television last week, but a celebrity’s foolish mistake on Chinese social media revealed that the so-called investigative journalism from the broadcaster was nothing but a PR offensive against the wrong targets. Each year on March 15, the Consumers’ Rights Protection Day in China, the state broadcaster runs a special TV show that takes to task shoddy products or substandard services in the name of alerting the nation and laying bare corporate evils. In this year, the show said that Chinese customers are not provided with the same customer service from Apple as it does to users in other countries. China Central Television had even gathered a number of journalist, they were wearing red color vest that look like Red Guards from the Cultural Revolution, ‘attacking’ the Apple store in Beijing to question the employees for the unfair warranty policy …

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Foxconn is Losing Orders for Apple’s Low-cost iPhone

Star Chang, Mar 17, 2013 10:29 PM, 921 views, 1 Comment »,

Apple was likely to diversify manufacturers for both its low-cost and legacy iPhones. Apple biggest contractor Foxconn would be losing orders for the upcoming low-cost iPhone. According to the analysta from KGI Research, who has a reliable track record in predicting Apple’s future product plans, said that the less expensive iPhone model will be offered in a range of colors and have a “super-thin plastic casing mixed with glass fiber.” The new material will make it stronger, thinner and lighter than typical smartphone plastic casings. Green Point of the Jabil group and Hi-P from Singapore are being tapped for producing the case, Foxconn will assemble the majority of the units, with Pegatron taking care of the rest …

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Knockoff iPhone 5S Debut Before Apple has Even Launched, First 1000 Units Sold Out (Video)

Star Chang, Mar 13, 2013 7:50 PM, 1,721 views, 3 Comments »,

Seeing Chinese Android-based knockoffs of Apple’s products isn’t anything new. Assuming Apple continues its tradition of releasing an “S” variant this year, China Shanzhai manufacturer has an early released of the Goophone i5S before Apple actually launch its original one. It’s visually similar to the current iPhone 5, as Apple’s iPhone 5S could look identical just as the 4S was to the 4. It runs Android 4.1 Jelly Bean with a heavily customized skin to make it look like iOS, users can switch between stock Android and the ripoff skin. Under the hood is Mediatek’s 1GHz MT6577 processor with only 512MB of RAM, and it has a 4-inch display with the same aspect ratio as iPhone 5, but resolution only at 854×480 pixel, no Retina display. 8GB on-board storage, 5MP back camera, 1.3MP front camera, fortunately, it doesn’t comes with lightning connector …

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Rumor: Pegatron will Start to Produce Less-pricey iPhone in May

Star Chang, Mar 5, 2013 4:09 PM, 912 views, 1 Comment »,

Taiwanese electronics manufacturer Pegatron – which produces some Apple products (iPad mini) alongside primary gadget builder Foxconn – has been commissioned to build a rumored less-pricey iPhone. According to the Taiwan-based newspaper Commercial Times, Pegatron will begin the pilot production for a low-cost version of iPhone in May, before Apple’s new products hit the market in the third quarter. Pegatron is forecast to ship about 40 million devices of the new iPhone model, whose price could be reduced to as low as US$350 (unlocked, contract-free) by adopting a plastic casing, also in conjunction with a choice of different colors. The iPad mini already have had a significant effect on sales of the full-size iPad. iPad mini is on pace to outsell its bigger brother. Market watchers believe the same ‘eroded effect’ might also occur in the iPhone series if a new cheaper iPhone is going to release this summer …

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Chinese Apple Users are Taking Their Risk to Repair iPhone and iPad by Themselves

Star Chang, Mar 2, 2013 12:15 PM, 1,183 views, Got something to say ?,

Savvy operators in China are making money by selling iPhone’s components and DIY maintenance kits as iPhone owners whose warranty has expired are taking to repair their devices themselves rather than taking in to Apple stores which charge hefty repair fees. Over at Taobao.com, the most popular online marketplace in China, there are thousands of Chinese vendors offering all sorts of iPhone components ranging from batteries, cameras, casings, screens and audio cables, along with full detailed instructions on how to carry out the repairs. The business has appeared alongside the growing number of complaints on Apple’s after-sales service. In China, when an iPhone is out of warranty, Apple will not replace individual parts alone, only faulty parts along with the handset’s motherboard and battery …

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Some Apple Factories in China Still Treat Workers “Like Slaves”

Star Chang, Feb 28, 2013 6:57 AM, 1,274 views, 5 Comments »,

According to SACOM (Student & Scholars Against Corporate Misbehavior), a Hong-Kong watchdog group, accused three of Apple’s Chinese suppliers of inhumane worker conditions. The three suppliers — Foxlink (produce connectors and cable), Pegatron (assemble iPad mini), and Wintek (displays supplier) — fail to provide for basic human needs and continue to use student workers. Apple has already increased its audits of Chinese factories and taken action against those that violate its supplier code of conduct. Regardless, SACOM’s report asserts that some conditions have worsened due in part to heavier demand for Apple products. Forced overtime continues to be imposed on factory workers, who sometimes put in as many as 14 hours a day with only one or two days off for three months at a stretch. Those hours violate both Chinese labor law and Apple’s own standards …

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Counterfeit Maker Prepares to Release iPad Mini Knockoff with Telephony Features

Star Chang, Feb 28, 2013 12:08 AM, 1,447 views, Got something to say ?,

Chinese counterfeit smartphone makers have reportedly produced a high quality fake version of the iPad mini, which called — the ‘mini Pad’. The counterfeit tablet has an almost identical appearance and users are able to make phone calls with the device. The picture shows that its connector resembles Apple’s lightning connector. The mini Pad features the same 7.9-inch screen but it comes in two versions with different CPU, a dual-core MT6577 and quad-core MT6588, both processing chip from MediaTek which support phone calls. And the installed operating system is of course Android with highly imitate iOS skin. We think that the add-on of telephony support is kind of awkward, you’re going to stick an almost 8-inch slate on your face for phone talking. The counterfeit maker has some unusual mindset that they might think is practical for this… One more pic after the jump.

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Did Lesser Demand of iPhone 5 Cause Suspension in Hiring of Foxconn Workers ?

Star Chang, Feb 20, 2013 3:59 PM, 562 views, 5 Comments »,

[UPDATE] According to Financial Times report, Foxconn has imposed a recruitment freeze this week across most of its factories in China. Human resources officials at Foxconn’s largest factories, local government officials and external recruiters working with the company said there had been internal notices to halt hiring until at least the end of March, in response to reduced orders for the iPhone 5. Recruiters said hiring has stopped for the iPhone and production lines in Shenzhen and Zhengzhou. Taiyuan, which makes iPhone parts, and Chengdu, which makes the iPad, were also putting a freeze on hiring. The suspension in hiring by Foxconn is the first such countrywide move since the 2009 downturn, prompted by the financial crisis. No large recruitment take place also give us a hint that there will be no Apple major new product coming soon …

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Why China Has More Demand on iPhone Jailbreak than the U.S.

Star Chang, Feb 13, 2013 5:23 PM, 1,926 views, 3 Comments »,

According to the statistics from pod2g’s iOS blog, Internet users in China are the top visitors of the Web site offering jailbreak tool, evasi0n, followed by the United States and France. Nearly 3 million Internet users from China visited the site, accounting for 20.12 percent of visitors. The country with the second-most number of visitors was the United States with 2.5 million users, contributing to 16.88 percent of traffic. The popularity of evasi0n jailbreak is tremendous. Within the first 10 minutes of released last week, it saw over 100,000 downloads. And now it had crossed the 1.7 million mark. China is widely seen to have a high software piracy rate, though the government has been working hard to improve intellectual property rights protection. It is to believe the piracy of desktop software will slowly reduced, the unhealthy practice may now shift to mobile sector …

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