Hands on with PlayStation Now

Sony's ambitious streaming-only game service is about to hit public beta. Here's what to expect.

CNET - I've recently become enamored with the idea of replaying games from my past because unlike a favorite film, I don't often experience a game twice.

Backwards compatibility has been a point of contention in previous generations of consoles, but with the arrival of Xbox One and PlayStation 4, legacy titles have taken a backseat. While Microsoft has yet to flesh out plans on addressing this void, Sony has aggressively teased PlayStation Now, a game-streaming service that not only chips away at the backwards compatibility shortcomings of PS4, but will soon offer the ability to stream archive games across multiple Sony platforms.

I've had a few weeks with the closed PlayStation Now beta, and while I'm told almost everything I've seen is subject to change, here are my first initial impressions of Sony's ambitious service.   Read More

E3 - Hands On With Splatoon, Nintendo's New Multiplayer Online Shooter

Forbes - I’m deep in enemy territory, surrounded by hostiles, and nearly out of ammo. But I still have a few tricks up my sleeve. Hefting my weapon, I squirt a tiny patch of green goo on the ground, and then dive into it; my squid form disappears into the murk.

When enemies come for me, I’ll be waiting. And when their backs are turned, I’ll drown them in my ink.

 

 

I’m playing a new Wii U game called Splatoon, which was announced this morning as part of Nintendo's E3 “digital event.” It’s a team-based first-person shooter, in the style of Team Fortress 2, but with a family-friendly Nintendo twist: The soldiers are cartoonish squidlike creatures, and you win by covering the ground of the arena in your team’s colored ink.

Each Splatoon match involves up to eight players in a four-on-four battle in an enclosed battlefield full of hallways, platforms, gates and ramps. Your soldier carries a weapon that looks like a big water gun, and it’s fed with brightly colored ink from a tank worn on your back; when you fire the gun, it squirts a solid stream of liquid that coats and colors anything it hits.

It feels like shooting propulsion gel from Portal 2, and has similar properties; when you’re on ground coated with your team’s color, you can dive and swim through it at high speed. You can climb up walls coated in your ink, or slip under obstacles via the colored ground underneath; you can even become effectively invisible to enemies if you stay still.     Read More

Samsung Galaxy S5 sells for $199.99 on-contract, preorders begin on Friday

CNET - US carriers begin announcing on- and off-contract pricing for Samsung's next flagship smartphone, as well as for Samsung's Gear family of wearables.

AT&T and US Cellular are the first US carriers to announce pricing and availability for the Samsung Galaxy S5, which globally goes on sale April 11 for $200 with a two-year contract.

If you're not into traditional contracts, AT&T's various pricing options also make room to buy the Galaxy S5 off contract for $650, or as part of its AT&T Next 18 and Next 12 programs, where you'll pay down $25 per month and $32.50 a month, respectively.   Read More

Samsung Galaxy S5 hands-on 

 

Hands On With Google Nexus 5 with LTE, Available Now

CNET -

It's finally here.

After months of leaks and rumors, Google officially announced its latest flagship phone, the Nexus 5, during a press event today in San Francisco. The device will run the latest Android 4.4 KitKat operating system, and like its predecessor, it will be manufactured by LG.

However, the handset features several key changes, like a bigger 4.95-inch screen, a faster Snapdragon 800 processor, and most notably LTE support. It will be available unlocked at the Google Play Store for $349 (16GB) and $399 (32GB) starting today.

Design

Once again, minimalism is key. Decorated with a simple vertically lined Nexus logo and an even subtler LG logo, the Nexus 5 sports a more subdued and restrained aesthetic that is still sleek. Instead of the lustrous, tile-patterned back that we saw on the Nexus 4, the black version of the 5 features a soft-touch matte backing that, during our brief time with it, we found makes it easier to grip.

Personally, we prefer this new simple look for the durability. As chic as the Nexus 4 was, many reported that its glass back cracked too easily; in fact, two of our own review units fractured as well.

The handset measures 5.43 inches tall, 2.72 inches wide, and 0.34 inch thick, but weighs even less than the previous generation, at 4.59 ounces. Sporting the biggest screen yet in relation to past Nexuses, it has a 4.95-inch Corning Gorilla Glass 3 display. Keeping up with its competitors like the Samsung Galaxy S4 and the HTC One, the Nexus 5's touch screen has a 1,920x1,080-pixel resolution and 445ppi. In contrast, the previous Nexus had a 1,280x768-pixel resolution with just 320 ppi.   More

Hands on with the massive Samsung UN-85S9 85-inch 4K TV

CNET - The UN-85S9 is massive, and massively expensive. At a special event in LA, we got to spend some time with it, watching 4K, Blu-ray, some test patterns ... even DVD

This thing is huge. There's just something about a TV this size that dominates a room. Even a big room. It plays tricks on the eyes, in a way, as your brain isn't accustomed to seeing a TV of such girth.

The UN-85S9 isn't just massive in size (85 inches, 189 pounds), but massive in price ($40,000) and resolution (Ultra HD "4K," of course).

I got to spend some time with it, and here's what I found out.

As you might have noticed, from the lack of "review" in the title, this isn't a full review. We only had limited time with the TV, and it wasn't at the CNET labs. Also, my name is not David or Ty. I did have access to a variety of equipment and test gear, though, so consider this a mostly-there-but-not-quite-full review.

Big

My "TV" at home is a projector on a 102-inch screen, and even I think this is a big TV. There's something about the presence of a device-of-unusual-size that is impressive. The easel design for the stand, which I thought looked odd at best, weird at worst, at CES, actually sort of works. It makes the TV look even bigger, and makes it look different from your average television. That makes sense for something this price.

Like Samsung's OLED and a few of its other new TVs, the UN-85S9 comes with the OneConnect box, an external input box where you connect all your sources, and then a single cable goes to the TV. Honestly, I like the idea. I think for most people it would make setup easier. More importantly, with HDMI 2.0 immanent, it's a lot easier to replace a OneConnect box than cracking open a TV and replacing the input board (or more).   More

Windows 8.1 in-depth hands-on: features, apps, impressions and screenshots

Engadget - The last time we wrote about Windows 8.1, we had lots to talk about, but very little to share in the way of hands-on impressions. You see, though Microsoft unveiled loads of new features, apps and UI tweaks, it only released a handful of screenshots -- and nobody outside the company was permitted to actually use the new software. Today, though, the OS update is available for anyone to download for free; in fact, because we're oh-so special, we've playing around with it for about 15 hours already. So while that's not enough time to put together a comprehensive review, we feel qualified to offer a few early thoughts. If you're curious, you can meet us after the break for impressions on everything from the new panorama capture feature to Xbox Radio. And yes, we brought screenshots this time. Lots of 'em.

Getting started

 

First things first: a disclosure. Because we started testing Windows 8.1 before it was actually available in the Windows Store, we had to borrow a Surface Pro from Microsoft with the software installed, similar to the way we routinely call in loans on review units. By the time you're reading this, though, the preview will be live in the Windows Store; all you'll have to do is hit download and let your system take care of the rest. As it happens, we expect it will be very hard to miss the download prompt in the store: Microsoft intends to add a "Windows 8.1 Preview is here" note even on individual app download pages. So even if it's the Vevo app you're after, you might still see a prompt to update the OS. Oh, and this might be a good time to give you a heads-up about apps: not all of them will run properly on Windows 8.1, at least not in the beginning. Microsoft says that's simply a function of the operating system still being in its preview phase. Ultimately, company reps say, the goal is for every app to run properly on 8.1, no exceptions.

Return of the Start button

 

Yes, as you may have heard, the Start button is back in Windows 8.1, insofar as there's now a Start icon fixed to the lower-left corner of the screen. (You can't disable it.) Click on it, though, and you'll still get the modern Start Screen, not the old-school fly-out menus. If you ask us, then, it's a little hyperbolic to call this a step backward, though it sure does make the OS feel a little more familiar.
If you really want to relive the old days of Windows, though, you'll need to make a few additional settings tweaks yet. For starters, you'll want to enable boot-to-desktop, by right-clicking on the Taskbar, and then clicking "Properties." Stay in that same menu, and you can opt to have the same wallpaper for both the desktop and Start Screen. And really, you should try this out, not that it's our place to tell you what to do. It's the sort of feature that should have been an option in Windows 8 to begin with. But as simple as it is, it's an important change too. Having a consistent wallpaper lends the OS a more cohesive feel, and makes the jump between the desktop and Start Screen feel much less disorienting. And that's a very good thing indeed.   More

Apple's iOS 7 is almost unrecognizable - Hands on With the New Mobile OS

CNET - SAN FRANCISCO -- To silence a growing chorus of discontent against an operating system design that's remained more or less static since 2007, Apple needed to go big. With iOS 7, it did. Apple's crisp, newly announced OS update gives the mobile operating system a radical new look and some first-for-Apple features for iPhone and iPad fans, like quick-access system controls, automatic app updates, and Apple's AirDrop file-sharing system.

The visual overhaul, which becomes available this fall, is a clean sweep that changes absolutely everything, from the typography and color schemes to the typical icon and button shape across the entire platform. And we mean the whole thing -- from the Safari browser to the photo app.

While there are a few notable new features in iOS 7, the new interface is by far the platform's deepest felt and most profoundly changed of the entire batch. Apple's other features are relatively uninspiring and do little to challenge competitors; however, we have a feeling that Apple is saving some major reveals for its next big iPhone announcement.

The fresh new look of Apple iOS 7 (pictures)

 

Design

Gone are the skeuomorphic interface elements that make icons and apps look like leather or paper or felt. Gone, too, are the slightly bubbly icon effects. Flat graphics and a dappled, pastel color scheme bring an elegant look. When you move the phone or tablet, Apple promises a 3D effect that makes your wallpaper appear some distance behind the icons.

Circles enter the design language, along with visuals that look nearly transparent, like a pane of glass. See what we mean in the slideshow above. The most important part of any deep design work is that it feels smooth and connected from screen to screen. We had a chance to sit down with some of the folks from Apple after the keynote and check out iOS 7 for ourselves.  More

Razer Edge becomes reality at CES: Hands-on with the tablet-PC-game console

CNET - LAS VEGAS--Gaming hardware usually takes a backseat at CES, but this year seems to be an exception. We've already seen Nvidia's blockbuster Project Shield handheld Android/PC game streaming device. Today Razer announced the Edge PC gaming tablet, and we took a good long look at and played with it along with Razer CEO Min-Liang Tan at this year's CES.

Razer teased the tablet at last year's CES under the code name Project Fiona. The company then conducted a crowd-sourcing campaign in which gamers provided Razer with feedback about the specs they'd like to see in a mobile PC gaming device.

Razer Edge brings full PC gaming to a versatile tablet (pictures)

 

It’s an innovative approach, but the result is what you could probably guess anyway: the Edge splits the difference between hard-core gaming PCs and tablets with a full-fledged Windows 8 tablet running an Intel Core i5 or i7 processor and Nvidia GeForce GT640M LE graphics. It looks...well, it looks like a tablet. But, under the hood, it has the guts of a high-powered gaming ultrabook.

 

(Credit: Rich Brown/CNET)

 

If the specs are perhaps predictable, it's the accessories that help it stand out.

The accessories help the Edge transform into a few different modes: a handheld dual-controller case looks nearly identical to the Project Fiona images shown last year. It adds gaming console-like buttons and sticks and makes the Edge a large gaming handheld, of a sort.

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Hands-on with the new $199 HTC Droid DNA

HTC jumps into phablets with Droid DNA (hands-on)

Design

On the surface, the slab-shaped HTC Droid DNA looks like just about every other Android smartphone on the market. The only touch of flair are signature Verizon-red highlights which circle the 8-megapixel megapixel camera lens and form a thin line above the screen. Frankly it gives the handset a classic Droid Incredible flavor similar to the HTC Droid Incredible 4G LTE That said I really like the long red stripes which run along both the left and right edges of the phone. HTC says it was inspired by Lamborghini supercars when crafting them. As for me, I just think the stripes, which are metallic and perferated by tiny holes, look futuristic and striking.

On back, the phone’s soft-touch surface cut from premium polycarbonate reminds me more of the HTC One X and One X+’s design language though. You’ll need that soft-touch coating too since its rubber feel provides a sure grip. The device is large, yet thin. Its 0.16-inch profile makes it thinner than the Samsung Galaxy S III. Picking up both handsets and placing them side-by-side, however, they seem to be of equal thickness, or shall I say thiness. This phone is razor-sharp, there's no doubt about that and its metal buttons and trim give it a much more premium feel than the Galaxy S III's plastic parts.


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Hands-on: Apple updates iMac with gorgeous new display

CNET - Apple announced a new iMac desktop this morning, the first update to its all-in-one line since May 2011. The new model brings Intel's third-generation Core CPUs (aka Ivy Bridge) to the iMac, as well as a gorgeous new thin display.

The new display is 5mm thick, making it the thinnest display on any all-in-one. The resolutions remain the same as on the previous generation of iMac desktops, 2,560x1,440 pixels on the 27-inch model, and 1,920x1,080 pixels for the 21.5-inch version.

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Hands-on with Samsung's $249 Chromebook

Google hopes to tap into new markets with the $249 Samsung 

Chromebook, a laptop running Google's browser-based 

Chrome OS and built atop a Samsung A15-class ARM processor.

(Credit: Stephen Shankland/CNET)

 

 

CNET - After using the new Samsung Chromebook for the better part of a workday, I have to say I'm impressed -- at least, considering the constraints of its $249 price tag.

Google announced the Samsung Chromebook today along with new ambitions to spread its browser-based, cloud-focused Chrome OS laptop much more widely. Google envisions it as being good as an extra machine that lies around the house or as a laptop for students.

I find it a reasonable device for those categories, especially for people like myself who already have their heads in the Google cloud with Google Docs, Google Drive, and Gmail. It's got workable if not standout hardware, its battery life is good, it switches on quickly, and the $249 price tag means it's not as much of a commitment as the $550 Samsung Series 5 550 that arrived in May.

However, given its sluggish performance sometimes, I can't say I was blown away by the Samsung Chromebook. It's fine for many tasks, but power users accustomed to having more than a couple dozen browser tabs open should steer clear.

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LG's 84-inch UD 3D TV makes its formal IFA debut, Engadget goes hands-on

Engadget - Here's yet another 84-inch 4K TV, this time from LG. The company's 84LM9600 was announced last week and has already started shipping in Korea, but it's here at IFA and poised to hit the market worldwide. Priced at about $22,105, this display is big in every way. You get a resolution of 3,840 x 2,160 -- four times the resolution of existing full HD panels -- and what LG calls "3D sound" thanks to 2.2 integrated channel speakers. 3D is courtesy of the company's passive glasses technology. So how does that all look?

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Microsoft Office 2013 Preview: Hands On

PCWorld - Office 2013 is touchscreen ready, cloud friendly, and adds bold new twists to the Microsoft Office franchise. On Monday Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer outlined what he said was the "biggest most ambitious Office" update to date.

For the desktop Office 2013 delivers a host of smart updates to Word, Outlook, and Excel. But where Office 2013 shines is embracing the mobile world and the cloud with deep integration with Microsoft’s cloud service SkyDrive and collaboration - integrating its recent acquisitions Skype and Yammer. Windows 8, and the upcoming release of Microsoft Surface tablets and Windows Phone 8 smartphones, also play a huge roles in coloring Office 2013 with new features.

Ahead of Microsoft's big news Monday Microsoft provided PCWorld with two Windows 8 tablets (no, not the Surface) and access to the customer preview versions of both Office 2013 and the cloud-based Office 365.

Here is a look at how the software suite runs on laptop, desktop touchscreen, and tablet platforms.
In this story, PCWorld Senior Editor Michael Brown first gives his impressions of working with Office 2013 and 365 on a laptop and a desktop PC. Contributing editor Tony Bradley then writes about his tests of the new products on a tablet PC.

Office 2013, Office 365 on a Laptop and a Desktop PC

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I spent most of my time with Word and Excel on a laptop and on a desktop all-in-one equipped with a touchscreen. As expected, Microsoft is tying Office 2013 and Office 365 tightly to its SkyDrive cloud-storage service.

You're free to use other services, but I suspect that this integration will lure plenty of Office users away from their paid accounts on Google, Dropbox, and SugarSync. If you buy a version of Microsoft's new software and sign up for a Microsoft Live account, you'll get 20GB of free storage in SkyDrive.

 


The Ofiice 365 Preview settings screen.

Both Office 2013 and Office 365 offer largely the same user experience, but Microsoft is clearly steering its customers toward the cloud-based version. The company is also marketing Office 365 to consumers for the first time, rather than strictly to businesses.    More
 

Hands-On With the Toshiba Excite 7.7 Android 4.0 Tablet

PCWorld - Long before the Toshiba Excite 7.7 got its name, its prospects were cause for excitement. The tablet's beefy Nvidia Tegra 3-powered specs, its slim and lightweight design, its Android 4.02 Ice Cream Sandwich operating system, and its high-resolution AMOLED display all made it a front-runner challenger on paper.



Now that it's here, I can report that this model fully lives up to its potential. The only disappointment lies with its steep price: $500 for the 16GB version--the same as the larger-screen third-generation iPad costs--and $580 for the 32GB model.

Next to the iPad's pricing, the Toshiba Excite 7.7 (previously seen at Mobile World Congress as the Toshiba AT270) feels astronomically expensive. That said, it comes in priced just 11 percent higher than the next closest competitor, the Verizon Samsung Galaxy Tab 7.7, which is $450 with a two-year contract. Granted, the Verizon model handles 4G LTE wireless communications, but that tablet is also stuck on last year's Android 3.x Honeycomb operating system. And its dual-core CPU performance is notably slower than that of the Tegra 3-based Excite 7.7.

At least the design of the Excite 7.7 matches its premium price. Aesthetically, it pleases the eye, and it's in keeping with the design of the 10.1-inch and 13.0-inch models in the Excite lineup, sporting a bronze-colored, textured aluminum back with matching plastic edges and well-defined buttons for the volume rocker, power, and rotation-lock slider.

The design is deceptive: Though the Excite 7.7 lacks the contour of the Samsung Galaxy Tab 7.7, the two models are of identical depth, 0.31 inch. The Excite 7.7 is slightly larger than the Tab, standing 8.1 inches tall to the Tab's 7.7 inches; and at 12.3 ounces (or 0.77 pound), it's a bit heavier than the Tab, by 3.2 ounces (or 0.2 pound). Interestingly, the Toshiba tablet feels lighter in the hand, probably due to the balance of the components inside.      More

Thunderbolt on Windows gets hands-on, lacks Mac's hot-swapping

Engadget -

Thunderbolt's 10-gigabit interface is only just making its way to Windows after spending more than a year as a Mac-only feature, so it's not surprising that a lot of questions surround how well the Apple- and Intel-developed connection works for those of a Microsoft persuasion. A thorough test at AnandTech of one of the first motherboards to support the spec on Windows PCs, an Ivy Bridge-ready board from MSI, has shown some positive signs along with a few flies in the high-speed ointment.            More

Call of Duty case mod has spinning gatling gun, energy drink fridge (hands-on)

Engadget - We’ve had our fill of Ultrabooks and tablets at CeBIT, so now it’s finally time to move on to the crazy stuff. This over-the-top case mod was awaiting unsuspecting attendees at the far back end of the China pavilion, of all places, and only caught our eye (or ear, rather) thanks to its squeaky gatling gun. It seems that this case first made an appearance at the Taipei Game Show last month, and has now landed on German shores, making a miraculous pass through EU customs to settle here, hidden amongst a hodgepodge of accessories on the outskirts of Hannover. This Thermaltake Level 10 GT chassis was modded by Brian Carter, and is highlighted by a six-barrel rotating gatling gun. There’s a bazooka up top where the handle would be, a .50 caliber cartridge on the side and a combination energy drink / hand sanitizer compartment just below. Yes, hand sanitizer. The rotating (and rather noisy) gatling gun makes our hands-on video a must-watch if you’re looking to get the full mod experience, so jump past the break and check it out.

Read More & Watch the Video!

Motorola Droid 4 hands-on: Awesome keyboard, blistering 4G LTE

(Credit: Sarah Tew/CNET)

CNET - At CES earlier this year, Motorola dropped a trio of new Verizon handsets offering welcome improvements over the company’s existing device selection. They were the now legendary Droid Razr Maxx, Droid Razr Purple, and Droid 4. Out of that lineup, it was the Droid 4 that initially grabbed my attention.

Why, you ask? The simple answer is that it melds dual-core processing, a quality keyboard, Android, and Verizon LTE in one phone. That’s the holy grail to some, at least for Android addicts who can’t seem to live without a real physical QWERTY keyboard. Motorola seriously disappointed Droid fans with its Droid 3, which lacked the final puzzle piece, LTE data. Enter the Droid 4.

Design

It’s clear to me that the Droid 4 takes its design cues from other devices in Motorola’s current 2012 lineup. The phone sports the black obelisk motif, complete with slightly rounded corners and beveled edges, as do the Droid Razr Maxx and Droid Razr. It’s a classy look sure to fit in equally at the office or out on the town. There’s no getting around, however, the large size of the Motorola Droid 4. I mean its girth stares at you right in the face practically begging for trouble. This bruiser measures 5 inches tall by 2.65 inches wide with a full thickness of half an inch. Weighing 6.31 ounces, the Droid 4 is also hefty. Compared with the wafer-thin trend modern smartphones are taking, this handset stands out.

The trade-off for all that extra mass is just what makes it appeal to a very vocal set of Android users, a superb keyboard. Sliding the phone open reveals a gloriously engineered typing surface. While I admit keys are tightly packed together, travel is deep and buttons provide a deliciously rubberized tactile feel. Consisting of five rows, not merely four like on lesser devices, it has a dedicated number row on top. I also really dig the way the backlighting traces the outline of the Droid 4′s squat rectangular keys. The spacebar goes on for what feels like miles and is easy to hit without looking down. The Droid 4′s directional pad is nice as well and something you don’t see often either.

To be clear, though, some things about the keyboard do bug me. First, there is no special key for “.com” or an emoticon button. Those are just minor quibbles, especially since there are keys for often-used punctuation marks such as comma, period, backslash, and equal sign for all you math nerds out there (just kiddin’, computation is cool). The majority of keys serve as secondary symbols too. One detractor is that to activate secondary functions, you need to hit the Shift key twice. This would be fine except that the button isn’t marked yellow like all the secondary symbols are. At least a light on the left indicates when secondary functions are engaged.                 More

Google’s Chrome for Android: A hands-on tour

Computerworld - After years of unexplained separation, Google’s Chrome browser and Android operating system are finally joining forces.

Google officially launched Chrome for Android on Tuesday. The app, available for any Android 4.0 (Ice Cream Sandwich) device, functions separately from the stock system browser — and offers plenty of advantages over it, too. In fact, Google says it expects the new Chrome browser to eventually replace the stock Android browser, becoming the platform’s default program for mobile Web access.

The reason Chrome for Android is only available on ICS devices, by the way, is because of the browser’s dependency on hardware acceleration — something earlier versions of Android don’t support.

But enough chit-chat: Let’s dive into the new Chrome for Android browser and see what this bad boy’s all about.

Chrome for Android: The User Interface

The first thing you notice about Chrome for Android is how different its interface is from the stock Android browser. Chrome for Android looks like, well, Chrome. The app has a clean, simple design with a light gray color scheme. It also has a handful of nice animations, like a pleasant slide-in effect when you open a new tab.




The app’s similiarity to the Chrome desktop browser is even more noticeable on a tablet than on a smartphone, thanks to the extra screen space and the way the app adjusts to fill that form.         More

Released Today - Why iOS 5 is a big deal

CNET - iOS 5, which made its debut at Apple’s Worldwide Developers Conference in June, marks a turning point for the company’s mobile software. Yes, it’s largely a collection of tweaks, improvements, and fiddling with a tried and true formula, but it’s also one that–for the first time–breaks iOS devices apart from computers running Apple’s iTunes software and goes further to try to unify the devices into the same family.

That vision is miles away from where Apple’s iPhone journey started and a response to the fact that iOS has long since rocketed past the company’s computers in popularity, with devices like the iPad growing to compete directly. No, this isn’t a “Mac OS X is dying” post, as much as now is a very good time to point out that what may seem like just another software update is something much bigger in the grand scheme of things.

The “PC Free” era

For the last four major versions of iOS, stretching all the way back to the original iPhone, Apple has demanded that users plug into a computer–be it a Mac or PC–to sync music, ferry over data, and grab software updates. Now those features are built into iOS itself.

Of course, if you have a computer, you can still plug in your device and continue to use iTunes, but Apple’s big idea is that these devices now stand on their own, right out of the box. That’s further augmented by a new wireless sync feature built into today’s iTunes 10.5 software update and iOS 5 that lets users continue to sync with their computer as they always have, but without the wires.

To get to the “PC free” era, as Apple’s calls it, the company’s gone through each built-in application to make sure it can function fully without the need for a computer running iTunes.

Apple laid the groundwork for that in previous system software updates, letting users download content from the iTunes Store directly onto devices. But where that was largely a ploy to encourage people to make more content purchases, this move takes the decoupling approach system-wide to make the hardware more appealing to those who wish it exclusively. That amounts to things like letting users delete media that’s been synced over from a computer, as well as editing photos that have been snapped on the device.

In order to make what could be considered a sacrifice of decoupling it to iTunes, Apple’s tied it to something else: iCloud. That’s Apple’s new cloud-based service that both stores and ferries files from one iOS device to another.

Launching tomorrow alongside iOS 5, iCloud does many of the same things as MobileMe (the service it’s replacing), while adding new hooks like:

-A back-up service that can store near-full copies of your iOS device on Apple’s servers for safe keeping
-The capability to re-download previously purchased content from any one of Apple’s digital stores
-A feature called Photo Stream that transfers photos from one device to another in the background
-File storage for app developers to keep certain files, like documents or application settings

Collectively, the service acts as a safety net for some of the things consumers originally needed a computer for when using these devices, something Apple is banking on to be attractive for users with one iOS device, or many.           More