Aside from a new pair of AirPods, Apple will also apparently launch a pair of Beats Fit Pro earbuds soon. According to 9to5Mac, the earbuds will be like the Beats Studio Buds which were released earlier this year, albeit with a slightly different design. The outlet found these images of the product in internal iOS 15.1 RC files.

Sources also told 9to5Mac that the Beats Fit Pro will have Active Noise Cancellation, Class 1 Bluetooth and Apple’s H1 chip for fast pairing with Apple products. It’ll apparently also feature a built-in accelerometer that’s designed to reduce external noise. As for battery life, the outlet reports that it’ll have 6 hours with ANC or Transparency Mode enabled or 7 hours with Adaptive EQ. The charging case will supposedly give it a total of around 27 to 30 hours of charge.

9to5Mac reports that Beats Fit Pro is scheduled to be announced the week of November 1st, with shipment occurring later.

Disney has shaken up its movie release calendar, with several Marvel Cinematic Universe flicks being delayed. The revamped schedule, which Variety reports is due to a production-related snowball effect, affects the slate for 2022 and beyond, and it will have a knock-on effect on Disney+.

All of the MCU films Disney had on the docket for 2022 have been pushed to a later slot. Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness was penciled in for March 25th, but now it's taking Thor: Love and Thunder's old date of May 6th. The next Thor movie will arrive on July 8th, in turn pushing back Black Panther: Wakanda Forever to November 11th.

The schedule shifts mean there will only be three Marvel movies next year instead of the planned four, as Captain Marvel sequel The Marvels now has a release date of February 17th, 2023. Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania has moved from that date to July 28th, 2023. On the flip side, Disney brought one mystery Marvel movie (hopefully Guardians of the Galaxy 3) forward by a week from November 10th, 2023.

Elsewhere, the next Indiana Jones movie has been delayed by 11 months. You'll need to wait until June 30th, 2023 for Harrison Ford's fifth stint as the iconic archeologist. Ford sustained an injury while filming this summer, though he's now back in action. A live-action Disney movie, a 20th Century film and two Marvel flicks (all untitled) have been removed from the 2023 schedule. 

Remarkably, given how many times the film has been delayed over the years, Disney hasn't shifted Avatar 2's release date. It's still on the schedule for December 16th, 2022.

It remains to be seen what impact these changes will have on Disney+. For the rest of 2021, Disney has committed to an exclusive theatrical window for its films before they're available to stream, but it hasn't divulged how things will work in 2022 and beyond.

The company adopted a simultaneous release strategy for some of its movies over the last year or so amid the COVID-19 pandemic, with Mulan, Raya and the Last Dragon, Cruella and Black Widow requiring a $30 Premier Access pass for early access on Disney+. Disney's decision to let viewers stream Black Widow at home on the same day it hit theaters prompted a now-settled lawsuit from star Scarlett Johansson. Pixar movies Soul and Luca went straight to streaming as part of regular Disney+ subscriptions in some countries.

Elsewhere, some MCU shows on Disney+, such as Loki and Hawkeye, tie into the theatrical movies. As such, the scheduling of future series might be impacted by the overhauled theatrical slate.

Apple made much ado of its redesigned MacBook Pro's creative prowess during its "Unleashed" event, and it's updating its flagship media editing software to take full advantage of the improved hardware. The company has released new versions of Final Cut Pro (10.6) and Logic Pro (10.7) that make the most of the M1 Pro and M1 Max, particularly in video processing and machine learning. FCP editors can play up to seven streams of 8K ProRes at once, and export in the format over five times faster — no mean feat for a laptop, as Apple was keen to point out. You can even color-grade 8K HDR footage using only the MacBook Pro's built-in screen.

There's also a new Object Tracker you can use to link animated effects to faces and objects. You can easily edit Cinematic Mode video from the iPhone 13 series, too. Motion now renders visual effects work up to two times faster, and can play two 8K video streams at five times the previous frame rate. Compressor, meanwhile, transcodes HEVC video up to twice as fast, and ProRes up to ten times as quickly. And if you live in Canon's world, you can transcode Cinema RAW Light videos to other formats for the first time. There's even a Watch Folders feature that will automatically encode content when it reaches a given folder — helpful for streamlining a workflow, particularly among teams.

The Logic Pro update, meanwhile, is focused on spatial audio creation — just in time for the new AirPods, of course. New mixers, panners and plugins let you author Dolby Atmos tracks, and the new MacBook Pros can use their added performance to create particularly advanced mixes. The music editing tool now comes bundled with the Producer Packs you saw in GarageBand, too, so you can integrate royalty-free beats and samples from the likes of Boys Noize, Mark Ronson and Trakgirl.

Both updates are free for existing users. Final Cut Pro normally costs $300 for new users, with Motion and Compressor costing $50 each. Logic Pro is priced at $200. The upgrades make the most sense if you're deeply invested in ProRes or intend to publish on Apple Music. Still, it's easy to see the appeal, at least for FCP. You could quickly turn around certain video projects using only your MacBook Pro, even if you're working primarily with 8K footage.

Follow all of the news from Apple’s Mac event right here.

Apple's "Unleashed" event today focused on music and the Mac, with the company revealing updated products in each category. We finally got word of the next-generation AirPods, which have a new design and support for spatial audio plus MagSage wireless charging. The company also unveiled new colors for its HomePod mini smart speaker and two new MacBook Pros for the power users among us. The laptops run on the company's new M1 Pro and M1 Max chipsets and sport revamped designs with webcam notches, Liquid Retina XDR displays and extra ports (HDMI and an SD slot!). Here's how to pre-order everything Apple announced today.

AirPods

Apple

Apple kicked off the show by talking about music and revealing new AirPods. The third-generation AirPods bring a new design, wireless charging capabilities and spatial audio support. They're available for pre-order today from Apple's website and cost $179. They'll be available in stores on October 26th.

The third-gen AirPods have a contoured design that looks similar to the AirPods Pro, but they don't have the interchangeable ear tips of Apple's more advanced earbuds. Inside the buds is a new low-distortion driver that produces powerful bass along with crisp highs. These buds have a few features previously only available on AirPods Pro and AirPods Max, including spatial audio and Adaptive EQ, the latter of which automatically adjusts frequencies in real time based on what you're listening to.

The new AirPods have a sweat and water-resistant design and Apple improved the battery life, too. These should last up to six hours on a charge, and you'll get an hour of listening time after only five minutes of charging. The case is now MagSafe and wireless-charging capable and it holds four additional full charges, so you can enjoy around 30 hours of total listening time.

Apple is keeping the second-generation AirPods around, which will be good for anyone who doesn't want to shell out $179 for the new ones. The second-generation AirPods are now priced at $129, and the AirPods Pro are still listed $250 (although you can often find them for less) and they now come with a MagSafe charging case.

MacBook Pro

Apple

Apple's latest 14- and 16-inch MacBook Pros come equipped with the company's new M1 Pro or M1 Max processors, and feature a brand new design with a webcam notch and some much-requested extra ports. Both models are available for pre-order today from Apple's website. The 14-inch MacBook Pro starts at $1,999 while the 16-inch version starts at $2,499. They'll be widely available on October 26th.

The new MacBook Pros have aluminum enclosures and an advanced thermal system that's built to handle the power that comes with Apple's latest, high-end chipsets. The laptop ushers in several significant design changes, including a new keyboard that's supposed to be more similar to the company's Magic Keyboard for iMac. Also, the TouchBar is gone; it's been replaced with physical Function keys, something that TouchBar skeptics will likely cheer.

These MacBook Pros are thicker than previous models because they actually have a healthy variety of ports. Both have a total of three Thunderbolt 4 ports along with an HDMI socket, an SD card slot, a headphone jack and a MagSafe connector for charging (although you can power up via the Thunderbolt ports as well). This will be a welcome change for power users who have been living the dongle life for years with previous-gen MacBook Pros.

Additionally, the new laptops have Liquid Retina XDR displays that reach almost to the end of the machines' lids, interrupted by a notch that holds the 1080p webcam. The 14-inch model has a 14.2-inch 3,024 x 1,964 resolution screen, to be precise, while the 16-inch model has a 16.2-inch 3,456 x 2,234 panel. Both support ProMotion with refresh rates up to 120Hz. Apple is promising up to 17 hours of video playback on the 14-inch model and up to 21 hours of video playback on the larger version. As for other specs, you can customize the laptops with up to 32GB of RAM and up to a whopping 8TB of storage.

HomePod mini

Apple

Lastly, Apple announced new colors of the HomePod mini: yellow, orange and blue. Those join the existing space gray and white color options and will be available to order from Apple's website in November for $99.

Follow all of the news from Apple’s Mac event right here.

The next version of macOS will be available to download beginning October 25th. Apple shared the release date alongside the new M1 Pro and M1 Max chips and a redesigned MacBook Pro.

The macOS Monterey update comes with notable improvements to FaceTime, including support for Spatial Audio, and the ability to use SharePlay to listen to music and watch videos with your friends. One of the biggest changes is the addition of Universal Control, which allows users to seamlessly move back and forth between an iPad and a Mac. The feature, which builds one earlier Continuity updates, allows users to drag and drop files between multiple devices and type on an iPad from a MacBook keyboard. 

But both SharePlay and Universal Control, which wasn’t available in initial betas of macOS Monterey, will be arriving after the initial update "later this fall," according to Apple.

The release also comes with a major update to Safari that’s at times been controversial due to significant changes to the tab bar and other key features. (The most recent beta brought back the tab bar by default after earlier versions of the update removed it.)

Developing...

Follow all of the news from Apple’s Mac event right here.

Apple revealed an all-new set of AirPods today, but the current model isn't going away just yet. The company also announced that it's cutting the price on the 2019 model from $159 to $129. That price includes the wireless charging case that works with Qi-certified accessories. 

Either way, you can expect to pay less for the previous-gen version. That could still be a smart purchase if you can live without features like Spatial Audio and Adaptive EQ, among other things. The 2019 model does still offer hands-free Siri, which is quite handy in its own right. For comparison, the second-generation model is currently $119 on Amazon, or $160 with wireless charging case. 

Follow all of the news from Apple’s Mac event right here.

It’s been five years since Apple released a totally redesigned version of the MacBook Pro, a laptop that opened the company up to years of criticism for everything from its flawed keyboard design and the Touch Bar to its lack of any ports besides USB-C. But as expected, Apple is giving the MacBook Pro a complete do-over again, and it sounds like it’ll be an improvement in a number of areas over the models it replaces.

Naturally, Apple’s latest laptops are using the company’s own custom silicon — this time, it’s the M1 Pro. As the rumors predicted, it’s a 5-nanometer, 10-core chip with eight high-performance cores and two efficiency cores. It's 70 percent faster than the M1, and has one 16 graphics cores. Apple also announced an M1 Max, which has twice the memory bandwidth as the M1 Pro (400GB/s), and it also has 32 graphics cores. The M1 Max also supports up to 64GB memory, a huge improvement over the 16GB of memory that was supported by the M1. 

When it comes to ports, those of us out there who miss the plentiful options on older MacBooks should be pretty happy here. The new MacBook Pro unsurprisingly features USB-C ports, but it also brings back an HDMI port and SD card slot, two much-missed options. There aren’t any USB-A ports here, but the SD card slot and HDMI port should definitely reduce the number of dongles or specific cords MacBook Pro owners need.

Another old friend from MacBooks past is making a return. Apple has implemented a new version of its MagSafe connector, which it used on its laptops for years prior to 2016. It’s different from the old connector, so you won’t be able to bust out a charger from years past and expect it to work, unfortunately.

This story is developing. Follow all of the news from Apple’s Mac event right here.

It's been almost a year since Apple unveiled its first custom chip for Macs, the ARM-based M1. As we saw in our review of the latest MacBook Air, MacBook Pro and colorful iMac, the M1 was a marvel, proving to be both faster than Intel and AMD's x86 processors, while also drawing far less power. Now to follow up, Apple is taking a two-pronged approach with M1 Pro and M1 Max, two chips that'll power the company's new MacBook Pro models.

Both chips are 10-core processors, a combination of eight high performance cores and two high efficiency units. What separates them are their GPU capabilities: the M1 Pro has up to a 16-core GPU while the Max has tops out with 32 graphics cores. In comparison, last year's M1 was an eight-core chip that maxed out with eight GPU cores.

Based on these specs, power users will see a much bigger performance upgrade by going for a MacBook Pro. Last year's M1-equipped 13-inch MacBook Pro wasn't much faster than the M1 Air—the Pro basically added a fan for more sustained workloads, whereas the Air was miraculously fan-less. That was an odd situation for Apple; it was both a testament to the power of Apple Silicon, and a sign that the company needed to devote more time to its powerful machines. (Don't forget, the 16-inch MacBook Pro was practically forgotten over the past year.)

Developing...

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There's no denying the popularity of Apple's AirPods, but the regular model is well overdue for a refresh. Announced in the spring of 2019, the second version of the company's iconic true wireless earbuds included improvements like faster pairing, hands-free Siri and wireless charging. When some companies are cranking out multiple models a year, Apple hasn't needed to do that, hence the two-year gap between new products. Today, the company finally debuted the third-generation AirPods with a updated design, Spatial Audio, Adaptive EQ and one-touch setup. 

Developing...

Follow all of the news from Apple’s Mac event right here.

Apple will soon offer the HomePod mini in three new colors. Announced during its Unleased event on Monday, the new yellow, orange and blue colorways will join the existing white and black models in November, with pricing set to remain at $99 in the US.

Follow all of the news from Apple’s Mac event right here.