Technologies

Apple’s ‘Wonderlust’ Event Highlights iPhone 15, USB-C and Apple Watch 9: Everything Announced

At its annual fall event, Apple launched its latest round of iPhones and watches. And yes, USB-C has landed on the iPhone 15.

It was a big day for the iPhone and Apple Watch as Apple rolled out the 2023 models: the iPhone 15, 15 Plus, 15 Pro and 15 Pro Max, Apple Watch Series 9 and Watch Ultra 2. And the moment you’ve all been waiting for — USB-C has landed in the iPhone and AirPods.

In addition to the big reveals, Apple tossed us the usual random scraps of updates to its products and services, and announced the availability of its operating systems. The company claims that by 2030 it will have net zero climate impact (in a skit featuring Oscar winner Octavia Spencer) and detailed all the ways it’s working toward that. iCloud Plus gets a couple of new tiers, as well — 6 and 12 terabytes — because everything takes up a lot more space.

For the play-by-play commentary during the event, you can relive the magic with our archived live blog.

iPhone 15 and 15 Plus

These inherit a lot from the iPhone 14 Pro, minus the telephoto camera, including the Dynamic Island widget that expands the camera cutout to show contextual information. The 15 Plus has a bigger battery and a 6.7-inch screen compared to the 6.1-inch of the 15. Both also use the second-generation Ultra Wideband chip that’s in the new watches.

In addition to USB-C charging, Apple has upped its MagSafe to support the Qi2 standard.

It uses «color infused glass» for the new back (giving more durable color) with an etched layer over it. The new main camera is 48 megapixels — still dual cameras — and uses pixel binning to improve low-light performance. It still uses digital zoom for 2x by cropping into the center of the sensor. And now you don’t have to remember to switch to portrait mode; it will autodetect. Plus, it lets you select a subject for focus after the fact.

Apple has expanded its emergency satellite service to roadside assistance. It’s launching in the US with AAA, and is included in the membership. Nonmembers can subscribe separately.

The new A16 Bionic chip with an improved neural engine adds aggressive background noise cancellation on calls (aka Voice Isolation).

The iPhone 15 starts at $799 and the Plus starts at $899 in the US. Both prices are with carrier activation.

iPhone 15 Pro and Pro Max

The Pro — 6.1 inches for Pro and 6.7 inches for Pro Max — now sports a titanium alloy case with an aluminum substructure, which makes it lighter (though not thinner) and better for heat dissipation, and has shrunken borders for more screen visibility. Their new internal design also improves repairability, partly because the back glass can be replaced.

The rumored Action button is real. It’s programmable and has haptic feedback, but still remains available for muting and works in conjunction with Dynamic Island. And like Android, there’s an always-on StandBy screen enabled by iOS 17.

Apple debuts the A17 Pro chip for these, which has a new GPU that includes ray-tracing acceleration (for augmented reality!). Metal, the company’s 3D graphics framework, includes optimized upscaling, plus provides more efficient (and therefore battery friendly) operation. Some console games will also be natively playable — Apple specifically called out Assassin’s Creed Mirage, coming next year.

The chip also has improved performance cores, a new neural engine, a dedicated AV1 decoder, a USB 3 controller and USB-C connection.

The New iPhone 15 Lineup Is Here. Here’s What They Can Do

iphone 15 in different color from an angled view

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The Max has a 48-megapixel camera with a larger sensor than the other models and coated lenses for fewer reflections. It’s got 24mm, 28mm and 35mm equivalent lenses on the main camera, and the company promises better detail and dynamic range. The 120mm telephoto lens uses a «tetraprism» design with three-axis sensor-shift image stabilization. There’s also a 3x zoom lens.

Video supports recording to an external USB drive, v-log encoding and ACES support (the latter two are big for pros). Because the Vision Pro headset is on the horizon, it lets you capture 3D spatial videos — later this year.

The $15 Pro starts at $999, with the Pro Max starting at $1,199; preorders start Friday and they ship on Sept. 22.

Apple Watch Series 9 and Watch Ultra

The new S9 chip powers the updated watch, with upgraded graphics and neural core for more streamlined operation and on-device processing of Siri requests, including logging and retrieving health data. The new Ultra Wideband chip will allow or improve location and control other Apple devices. And the display is brighter and can get darker, which should improve visibility in dim or bright lighting. On the inside it’s also got an A16 Bionic chip.

The company says that the Series 9 is net zero, its first carbon-neutral product; part of that is replacing leather bands with a new material it calls «FineWoven.» New faces, colors and materials: There are a lot of new bands.

There’s a gesture that’s been repurposed from its accessibility tools — Double Tap — which controls the primary button in an app and scrolls through widgets, among other things.

It’s shipping in October, also in a new pink color, and preorders are live now.

In addition to all the updates to the Series 9, the new display on the Ultra goes up to 3,000 nits of brightness (that’s pretty bright, significantly brighter than the Series 9’s 2,000 nits), and offers a new modular face. It also has an expanded altitude range.

It too has an improved environmental impact, such as using 95% recycled titanium.

Both watches are available starting Sept. 22; they begin at $399 for the Series 9 and $799 for the Ultra 2.

Technologies

Today’s NYT Mini Crossword Answers for Saturday, April 18

Here are the answers for The New York Times Mini Crossword for April 18

Looking for the most recent Mini Crossword answer? Click here for today’s Mini Crossword hints, as well as our daily answers and hints for The New York Times Wordle, Strands, Connections and Connections: Sports Edition puzzles.

Need some help with today’s Mini Crossword? It’s the super-long one as always on Saturdays, and a few of the clues are tricky. But if you play all the other New York Times games, 13-Across will be easy. Read on for all the answers. And if you could use some hints and guidance for daily solving, check out our Mini Crossword tips.

If you’re looking for today’s Wordle, Connections, Connections: Sports Edition and Strands answers, you can visit CNET’s NYT puzzle hints page.

Read more: Tips and Tricks for Solving The New York Times Mini Crossword

Let’s get to those Mini Crossword clues and answers.

Mini across clues and answers

1A clue: What people pay Extra for?
Answer: GUM

4A clue: Pre-meal prayer
Answer: GRACE

6A clue: Physicist Bohr
Answer: NIELS

7A clue: Line up a shot
Answer: AIM

8A clue: Photo ___ (P.R. events)
Answer: OPS

10A clue: «Zootopia,» but not «Zoolander»
Answer: PGMOVIE

12A clue: TV show with the initials «TV»
Answer: THEVIEW

13A clue: New York Times game with weaving, interconnected answers
Answer: STRANDS

Mini down clues and answers

1D clue: More bleak
Answer: GRIMMER

2D clue: Dubai’s country, for short
Answer: UAE

3D clue: Nickname of Seth and Evan’s friend in «Superbad»
Answer: MCLOVIN

4D clue: «See you in the mornin’!»
Answer: GNIGHT

5D clue: Fancy term for «noticed»
Answer: ESPIED

7D clue: Many N.Y.C. addresses: Abbr.
Answer: APTS

9D clue: Uses a needle and thread
Answer: SEWS

11D clue: Egg cells
Answer: OVA

Technologies

AI Trusted Less Than Social Media and Airlines, With Grok Placing Last, Survey Says

More Americans are concerned about the loss of personal interaction from AI than they are about potential job loss.

Google Gemini is the most trusted AI platform among its competition, but many people still have concerns about the technology, according to an American Customer Satisfaction Index poll released Thursday.

In ACSI’s results, AI scored an overall customer satisfaction score of 73 on a scale of 0 to 100, which the authors noted was slightly below social media (74), airlines and mortgage lenders, but in line with energy utilities.

Of the five platforms mentioned in the survey, Google Gemini led with 76, followed by Microsoft Copilot (74), Claude and ChatGPT (both 73), and Grok and Perplexity (both 71). Meanwhile, TikTok (77) and YouTube (78) both scored better than the AI platforms.

Gemini is one of the most prolific AI services, with access via smart speakers, TVs, phones and computers, while most ChatGPT users access the AI tool via the ChatGPT website or mobile app, and Grok via social media platform X.

The ACSI poll found that 43% of respondents said reduced human-to-human interaction is their main concern, followed by job loss for future generations (37%) and their own job risk (31%), based on interviews with 2,711 US adults.

Baby Boomers were the most skeptical generation in the poll, with 35% saying they are very concerned about AI’s effects, compared to just 6% who view it extremely favorably.

Disconnect between AI adoption and perception

While platforms such as ChatGPT have up to 1 billion weekly users, there is still a disconnect between AI’s adoption and public perception of it, which is driven by concerns over privacy, the spread of misinformation and the loss of jobs.

«Consumers spent the last decade learning to distrust how social media platforms handle their data, and AI’s privacy scores suggest they’re carrying that skepticism forward,» said Forrest Morgeson, associate professor of marketing at Michigan State University and director of research emeritus at the ACSI.

21% reported an «extremely favorable» outlook toward AI, while an equal 21% said they are «very concerned about the consequences.»

These results were in line with another poll published by YouGov this week, which found that only 29% think the positive effects of AI outweigh the negative ones, while 36% think its net effects are negative.

It’s worth noting that more than half of the people interviewed (56%) had no recent experience with AI, but of the 44% who did, half of them use AI at least once a day, and the usage went up with people who earned over $100,000 a year.

Last month, an NBC poll suggested that AI was one of the least-liked things in America, but it was still more popular than the Democratic Party.

Technologies

Today’s NYT Connections Hints, Answers and Help for April 18, #1042

Here are some hints and the answers for the NYT Connections puzzle for April 18, No. 1,042.

Looking for the most recent Connections answers? Click here for today’s Connections hints, as well as our daily answers and hints for The New York Times Mini Crossword, Wordle, Connections: Sports Edition and Strands puzzles.

Today’s NYT Connections puzzle features a fun purple category that’ll require you to spot certain beverage names. Read on for clues and today’s Connections answers.

The Times has a Connections Bot, like the one for Wordle. Go there after you play to receive a numeric score and to have the program analyze your answers. Players who are registered with the Times Games section can now nerd out by following their progress, including the number of puzzles completed, win rate, number of times they nabbed a perfect score and their win streak.

Read more: Hints, Tips and Strategies to Help You Win at NYT Connections Every Time

Hints for today’s Connections groups

Here are four hints for the groupings in today’s Connections puzzle, ranked from the easiest yellow group to the tough (and sometimes bizarre) purple group.

Yellow group hint: Wow!

Green group hint: Plug it in.

Blue group hint: Cinderella team.

Purple group hint: Drink up.