retina

Apple plans Q3 launch for MacBook Air with Retina -- report

Apple's MacBook Air could be next to get Retina display treatment, according to a new report.

The Mac maker is planning to bring the Retina display to the MacBook Air in the third quarter of 2013, Taiwan-based newspaper Economic Daily is reporting today, citing sources in the company's supply chain. The Retina display will come bundled in both the 11- and 13-inch MacBook Air models, according to the report.

Apple last week cut the price of its 256GB MacBook Air by $100, to $1,400. The move was a response to it dropping the price of its MacBook … Read more

Asia chatter predicts increase in cost of Retina iPad Mini

Chatter in Asia has it that the total cost of the iPad Mini could increase by almost a third -- though no word on whether that would impact price.

Commentary in Digitimes, which is close to the chain of component suppliers in Asia, said the jump to a Retina screen means adding costly display components.

If iPad mini adopts the Retina display, the dots per inch (DPI) will be higher and the brightness of the backlight modules will have to improve. This also means the number of LEDs used will...[increase the total cost] by more than 30% if it … Read more

FDA approves bionic eye for adults with rare genetic disease

For most of us, light-sensitive cells that line our retinas convert light rays into electrical impulses that travel through the optic nerve to the brain to be assembled into images. But for an estimated 1 in 4,000 people in the U.S. with a genetic condition called retinitis pigmentosa, or RP, those cells are damaged, which most commonly impairs vision at night. What's more, treatment to prevent eventual (if unlikely) total blindness remains elusive.

Enter the Argus II Retinal Prosthesis System, which the FDA approved today to treat a very specific population: adults 25 and older with severe to profound RP who have bare or no light perception in both eyes but inner layer retinal function and a history of the ability to see forms.

Though the bionic eye doesn't restore vision to these patients, it could allow them to detect light and dark, which in turn could help them identify the movement or location of objects.… Read more

Apple cuts MacBook Pro Retina prices, bumps specs

Apple today dropped the prices in its line of MacBook Pro laptops with Retina display while boosting processor speeds.

The 13-inch MacBook Pro with Retina now starts $1,499, or $200 less than before. The higher-capacity 256GB version costs $1,699, or $300 cheaper than the original price. The processor clock speed also gets boosted to 2.6 gigahertz from 2.5GHz.

The 15-inch MacBook Pro with Retina gets a speed boost, with the lower-end version getting its clock speed bumped up to 2.4GHz from 2.3GHz, and the higher-end version getting bumped up to 2.7GHz quad-core processor … Read more

OLED displays? They're 'awful,' says Apple's CEO

Apple CEO Tim Cook is definitely not a fan of OLED displays.

Cook, speaking at an investor conference hosted by Goldman Sachs in San Francisco today, called the color saturation of OLED (organic light-emitting diode) displays "awful."

"If you ever buy anything online and really want to know what he color is, as many people do, you should really think twice before you depend on the color from an OLED display," Cook said.

Conversely, Cook called Apple's Retina Display a superior experience, noting that it is twice as bright.

That's a shot at mobile … Read more

iPad Mini Retina Display may surpass iPad 4

The iPad Mini is ripe for a Retina display -- and it's already in the works, according to the latest Asia-based gossip.

The "iPad Mini 2" will have a Retina screen boasting 324 pixels per inch (PPI), according to a Chinese language report via BrightWire.

That's based on an 7.9-inch iPad Mini with 2,048x1,536 resolution display -- which simply doubles the resolution of the current iPad Mini's 1,024x768 screen.

And that's the same resolution of the current 9.7-inch Retina iPad.

But packing all of those pixels into the Mini'… Read more

Rarefied Retina MacBook Pros get priced closer to earth

MacBook Pros equipped with a Retina display are not exactly priced to move. Best Buy and Amazon are trying to change that.

Best Buy, for example, is now selling the 128GB version (model MC975LL/A) of the 13.3-inch MacBook Pro Retina for $1,549.99, $150 off the regular $1,699.99 price.

Need 256GB of solid-state storage with that gorgeous Retina screen? That model (MD213LL/A) is now $1,799.99, $200 off the regular price of $1,999.99.

The pricier 15.4-inch models with 256GB and 512GB solid-state drives (MC975LL/A and MC976LL/A, respectively), also … Read more

Apple, photographer settle 'Retina' eyeball image lawsuit

Apple and Swiss photographer Sabine Liewald have settled a lawsuit involving the alleged misuse of an eyeball image used during one of Apple's keynote presentations.

News of the settlement came in a court-ordered dismissal dated last Wednesday. The two parties were scheduled to meet for a pretrial conference earlier today.

Terms were not disclosed, and Apple did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

The original complaint said Apple misused one of Liewald's images (seen above) by including it in a promotion for its latest MacBook Pro computers with the Retina display. Liewald argued that Apple acquired … Read more

Archos 97 Titanium HD tablet to offer Retina-like display

Archos attempts to strengthen its Element series of tablets by announcing the 97 Titanium HD. The 9.7-inch tablet will ship with Android 4.1 and a promising 2,048x1,536-pixel IPS display. This matches the resolution of the current-generation iPad.

The tablet houses a 1.6GHz dual-core A9 processor, a quad-core Mali 400 MP4 GPU, 1GB of RAM, and 8GB of internal storage. Other features include a microSD expansion slot, Micro-USB port, a 5-megapixel rear-facing camera, and a 2-megapixel front-facing camera.

The Archos 97 Titanium pricing is set at $249 but a release date has yet to be announced. … Read more