How China Rips Off the iPhone and Fragments Android Even More

Sam Byford writes how China rips off the iPhone and continues to fragment the Android market with new operating systems and knockoffs.

For the unfamiliar, Chinese phone software can be garish, heavy-handed, and quite unlike anything installed on phones that are popular outside of Asia. If there’s anything that’s going to turn you off the brand-new Huawei Mate 20 Pro, for example — unsubstantiated Cold War-esque paranoia aside — it’s likely to be the software.

Back when I used to write for an Android website (I know, shocking!) I had received a Chinese phone to review. It had adware and possibly other malignant stuff built right in, so I won’t gush over Chinese hardware like The Verge does.

Oh, and the aforementioned Cold War-esque paranoia? I assume Mr. Byford refers to the government ban on Huawei and ZTE. But I guess it’s a personal choice if you want to heed the warning or not.

Analyst Ming-Chi Kuo Says A-series Macs Really Are Coming

The clues are all there. Apple has a mind to move its Macs to the A-series CPU. We discussed this at length on our TDO podcast recently. And now, Ming-Chi Kuo of TF Securities has confirmed it. Mike Wuerthele at AppleInsider reports: “Kuo also predicts that Mac models will adopt Apple’s A-series processor in some form starting 2020 or 2021.” So does that mean the 2019 Mac Pro will remain with Intel CPUs? And then make an abrupt jump in 2020?  The mind boggles.

The World's Largest Apple Collection is For Sale

An Austrian computer repairman has amassed what is possibly the world’s largest Apple collection, and it’s currently for sale.

Over the years since he began working for a company that repaired Apples in Vienna in the 1980s, Roland Borsky’s collection has grown to roughly 1,100 computers, he says – far more than the 472 items at Prague’s Apple Museum, which says it is the world’s biggest private collection of Apple products.

Now that his income has dried up, Borsky says he cannot afford the rent on his warehouse. He hopes that a benefactor will put his collection on display and pay off his debt of 20,000-30,000 euros ($23,000-35,000).

If someone doesn’t buy the collection it will have to be destroyed.