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Farewell iPhone Ports? iOS 13.4 Beta Tips Over-the-Air Recovery Feature

A new feature in the beta appears to let you restore a non-functioning iPhone without plugging it into a PC.

 & Michael Muchmore Contributor

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Annoyed by the continued lack of headphone ports on Apple's iPhone lineup? Don't hold your breath for their return. An over-the-air recovery feature in the iOS 13.4 Developer Beta 3 might obviate the need for phone ports at all, 9to5Mac reports.

You can already restore an iPhone profile with iCloud, but that’s only useful for a functioning iPhone, like when you buy a new phone and want to load it up with all your apps, photos, and files from your old iPhone in one step. For a phone that’s unresponsive, you need to plug it into a desktop computer and flash the hardware. On Windows, you use the iTunes app for this, and on a Mac you do it through the Finder.

But that’s pretty much the only thing left that requires you to connect your iPhone physically to another device. If Apple rolls out an over-the-air recovery feature, you could do that wirelessly. But as 9to5Mac notes, "it’s not yet possible to access it in the system as the feature is still under development and it could be scrapped at any time."

The officially announced new features in this iOS beta are less exciting, and include things like more QuickType Keyboard language support, a location privacy update, and Photos shortcuts “which allow you to quickly navigate between tabs, search, and create albums.”

MacRumors also found a new CarKey capability that lets users “lock, unlock, and start a car that has NFC capabilities.” It also found a new Mail toolbar for iOS and iPadOS, iCloud Folder Sharing, and nine new Memoji and Animoji expressions, including rolling eyes.

Significantly for iOS developers, the beta adds support for Universal Purchases, which lets users who buy an app on one device run them on others, whether the other device is an iPhone, iPad, or Mac computer.

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About Our Expert

Michael Muchmore

Michael Muchmore

Contributor

My Experience

I've been testing PC and mobile software for more than 20 years, focusing on photo and video editing, operating systems, and web browsers. Prior to my current role, I covered software and apps for ExtremeTech and headed up PCMag’s enterprise software team. I’ve attended trade shows for Microsoft, Google, and Apple and written about all of them and their products.

I still get a kick out of seeing what's new in video and photo editing software, and how operating systems change over time. I was privileged to byline the cover story of the last print issue of PC Magazine, the Windows 7 review, and I’ve witnessed every Microsoft misstep and win, up to the latest Windows 11.

I’m an avid bird photographer and traveler—I’ve been to 40 countries, many with great birds! Because I’m also a classical music fan and former performer, I’ve reviewed streaming services that emphasize classical music.

Technology I Use

For everyday work, I use a good-old Dell tower with 16GB of RAM, a 12th-gen Intel Core i7 processor, and an Nvidia RTX 3060 Ti GPU that runs on Windows 11. I pair it with a 4K Lenovo ThinkVision P27u-10 monitor and a Logitech MX Vertical mouse. For offsite work, I use a 2024 Microsoft Surface Laptop with a Qualcomm Snapdragon X Elite processor. Camera-wise, I moved to mirrorless from a Canon EOS 80D with a Canon 70-300mm IS USM lens. I now have a Canon EOS R7 with a 100-400mm lens, but I miss my DSLR for several reasons.

In order of usage, the software I turn to most frequently is the Edge web browser, Slack, Adobe Creative Cloud, Microsoft 365, Firefox, Brave, and WhatsApp. I use the Windows Phone link app to see everything on my Samsung Galaxy S21 Ultra phone, which has excellent telephoto capability.

For fitness monitoring, I have a Fitbit Charge 6 and use an Anker Smart Scale P1. I’m also a streaming fan, so I subscribe to both Amazon Music Unlimited (especially for its Dolby Atmos content) and Qobuz (for its high-res sound quality and classical catalog). I recently added a Vizio 5.1 Soundbar SE, which sounds surprisingly good given its low price. To holler commands instead of using a remote control, I have the Amazon Fire TV Cube in the living room, which lets me verbally tell the TV what I want to watch. It hooks up to an LG B4 OLED TV. I have a Sonos One speaker in my kitchen that also ties in with Alexa, as does the Echo Dot 2 With Clock in my bedroom. For serious listening, I have B&W 601 speakers plugged into a Conrad-Johnson Sonographe amp and preamp, with a Cambridge Audio AXN10 streamer as source. For reading, I also have a Nook GlowLight 3.

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