Oft-repeated rumors of an upgrade of Apple's desktop lines- composed of the "affordable" Mac Mini, the all-in-one iMac and the Mac Pro- have finally stopped as Apple finally upgraded them under-the-hood.
Notably, all of them have received the proprietary Mini DisplayPort, as well as improved nVidia graphics cards. The Mac Pro will still have the option for a AMD (or ATi) card.
Much awaited update
Mac Mini fans can rejoice for their baby has been resurrected. For four years straight, Apple hasn't given an upgrade the little guy. Despite the new features, the price is still retained.
More sulit factor
The iMac's all-in-one factor is very famous, but the notable thing about it is not a new form factor- but a better 'sulit' factor. The mid-range iMac now features the 24-inch screen rather than the 20-incher, and it now comes with 4GB RAM standard as well as nVidia graphics.
Shell out more and you'd be able to get the same video card that comes with the professional Mac Pro.
Unfortunately, the Mini DVI and Firewire 400 ports have been dumped.
Nehalem Power!
Mac Pro is the only tower Apple has, and many review sites have noted its innovative structure in its interior, which is why Apple has made it a selling point.
"Beautiful outside, beautiful inside."
Anyway, it has the power of the just-released Intel Nehalem chips, and it also gets a new graphics chip (and Mini DisplayPort). It can be set to run at 32GB of RAM, 4TB of HDD memory and can come in either 4-core (for $2499) or 8-core processors (for $3299).
If you're wondering why the prices are so high, then you shouldn't because this rig is for pro's.
I forgot to mention the iPhone 3G's Bluetooth features, which are extremely limited. How, you say? Well, typically you are able to transfer files from cellphone to cellphone via Bluetooth. Here? Definitely not. The only use for Bluetooth is for the hands-free Bluetooth headsets. Yes, it can still pair with another phone/computer with Bluetooth, but what can you do while a mobile phone or computer is paired? Nothing except being able to unpair. It can't at least be the receiving end of the file you want to send, so, yes, if I want to send my dad's iPhone some kind of music file, it's a lost cause.
However, I've updated the firmware of my dad's iPhone 3G (to the latest 2.1), and you know what? Many performance and call quirks we experienced are virtually non-existent now. Back-up times in iTunes are dramatically speedier, and so is application installation. Now we don't have to wait 20 minutes for back-up to finish!
Plus, the iPhone is responsive after hanging up from a call. The screen is actually supposed to detect your face so it will black out when calling. You know, avoid accidental button pushing via your cheeks, and it now works excellently. When your face gets out of the screen after calling (or when you want to hang up), everything will appear as it should. It's actually a nice touch now that I know why the screen wouldn't show up unless it wanted to before updating.
Speaking of calling, the signal we get around here has significantly improved. Back then, 3G was next to impossible to get. Now, reception is very strong.
Apps are generally more stable, and so is Safari. The screen, while already snappy and responsive, is impossibly even more zippy! 2.1 is the update to get, even though yes, there's still no video recording, no copy and paste, no MMS and no SMS forwarding, but if you already love your iPhone 3G or iPod touch even before this update, you'll love it even more after updating.
Now if only it wasn't such a beast. (230+ MB download?!)
My rating for the iPhone 3G still won't change, so I stand by my 7.5 rating. I actually wanted to decrease the score by 0.5 because of the limited Bluetooth functionality, but the update straightened other things out, so you can say that they, like protons and neutrons, cancel each other.
Way back even before the September special event held by Apple to announce iTunes 8 and the new iPods, several rumors and leaks have already popped up about a sort of "Genius" feature included in the iTunes 8 upgrade. Like the popular websites Pandora and Last.fm, the feature tries to create a playlist that it thinks sound great together with this one song you yourself pick. Does it work? What about the other features in iTunes 8? Well let's see then...
Genius This is the most advertised feature but does it work?
Well, it actually depends on how many songs (or rather, song genres) you actually have in your library.
But it's not exactly activated at first launch, though. First, you'll have to send your entire library to Apple, so they can process it and determine which songs sound great with each other. Of course, you don't need to fill in some private information, but if hackers found a way to access your computer via this feature, (because Apple sends information back to you) I'll be damned. Anyway, once you activate Genius, you can plug in any upgraded iPhone 3G, upgraded first generation iPod touch, 2nd generation iPod touch, 4th generation Nano and 6th generation Classic to activate the feature in those machines. Besides that, you can now use that new atom button thingy below. You first play a song- any song- and click that button so you can let iTunes generate a "Genius playlist". I based my first ever Genius playlist on Jason Mraz's "I'm Yours", and the results are snappy but some of the choices made are pretty questionable. Panic! At The Disco? Daughtry? Fall Out Boy? Wait, I never knew they'd potentially sound good alongside something like "I'm Yours"!
Still, I have to give effort points to the system, and really, I don't blame it for the choices since I'm more of a rock/alt fan than pop. Still, if you're unsatisfied with the results, you can always Refresh it. And when iTunes gives you that perfect combination, you can Save that playlist (although you can still Refresh it anyway) and sync it to your iPod.
So I tried putting more varieties of songs into the library, then updating Genius, and what do you know? It became smarter. The questionable choices were less, and the playlist was a lot better. If you hate Genius though, I won't blame you. It's very much new, so if you give it enough time, and if a lot more people use it, the system will become smarter. It's still off to a great start regardless.
New Browsing mode Back then, it was just that "spreadsheet" style of music browsing. It was pretty boring, even with Cover Flow. Now, Apple gives the browsing style an overhaul. The spreadsheet style is still there for those who opt for it, but for those who want a new way to browse their music, they can use the revamped Grid view. If you're a Mac user, you'll notice that the design is reminiscent to that of iPhoto. And if an artist has, say, 2 or 3 albums, you can look at them by pulling the mouse cursor up or down, left or right. To play the whole album or artist, you can just click the "Play Album" button that appears when you hover your mouse over it. You can resize the size of each album cover (and the captions underneath them) if you're blind, and you can sort them by Artist, Genres, Composers and Albums. (AT TOP: You can view albums by Genre or; BELOW: ...get this view in the Podcasts, TV Shows and Movies menus. Noticeable in the Podcast menu are blue numbered circles marking the number of unwatched/unheard podcasts.)
New Visualizer I don't know if you still use a visualizer in this day and age (I sure don't), except for Windows Media Player fans (they have no choice), but if you like them, you will like the new Visualizer Apple put in the new version. It's actually very pretty if you ask me. But as I said: I don't think anyone would be using this very often. Especially since it's a...
Memory Hog iTunes has a reputation of being a big memory hog. Unless you're running a Mac, not all processes run silky smooth in iTunes 8. It's slow, it's unresponsive, and damn, it just brings CPU usage up the roof. Heck, it causes the Blue Screen of Death in Vista! That can't be good. Of course, Apple has re-uploaded a fixed version of the Windows iTunes, but this just makes me ask whether Apple even tests its software before releasing it to the public? Surely, you should like any normal company? Or maybe your Windows developers just got lazy or something?
A hassle to download It's like really HUGE! It's ginormous! It's a music and video player for God's sakes! Even VLC is only like 4-5MB's or something! I'd accept 20MB, but 60MB is like... a real hassle to download even on a broadband network. Apple needs to reduce the file size for this thing, damn it.
Overall Genius needs a bit of time to mature, but it's off to a good start. The new view is welcome, and the visualizer is really beautiful, but kind of pointless. I'm not sure why Apple still hasn't fixed the memory leaks and all, and they sure haven't reduced the file size of this beast, but other than that, this upgrade is pretty nice- especially if you want to buy a new iPod (or upgrade your iPod touch or iPhones), but for other people who still don't plan to buy a new iPod or upgrade their existing iPod touch or iPhones can stick to iTunes 7 if they so choose to. Genius isn't really that much of a reason to download in the first place, but it's still a really fun feature to toy with.
Of course, you have the standard music and (limited) video playing options, and they work as they should. Aforementioned hogging may cause a broken listening and viewing experience at times, though.
In WWDC, there is bound to be a big product launch or two- and this year is no exception. This year, it's about the iPhone- what will become of it, and if there is even a new one.
Will everyone be happy, or will everyone be sad about the long awaited iPhone 2. What about current owners? What'll happen to their obsoletely expensive hacked iPhones? How much will this new iPhone cost? And what'll Globe bring out? All these answers and more coming to you!
NOTE: If you are only interested in the 3G iPhone because you don't own an old iPhone, scroll down until you see a sign. Don't worry, you'll see that sign. iPhone 2.0 Not to be confused with the 3G iPhone, the iPhone 2.0 is an iPhone software update that's been widely awaited by owners. So yes, longevity of your old iPhone can be rest assured but... what will it have?
Software Development Kit (Games, Productivity, Education) Apple introduced the new iPhone upgrade features and software and I guess it's pretty cool. What they introduced with regards to the enterprise users are the Microsoft Exchange server and secure Wi-Fi connection. Although that's not really major for us ordinary people, big corporations have hailed it as a great help to their productivity and at least it's pretty good to see that the iPhone is finally a real smartphone.
Next, Apple introduced once again the SDK program and showed off how people "enjoyed" developing programs for the iPhone. The first program they introduced was a Sega game- Super Monkey Ball- and it is able to be controlled via tilting the thing. Pretty good, but pretty expensive at 10 dollars, although it does have 110 levels- ridiculously many for a phone.
And then, there was the eBay program which was surprising since eBay didn't advise Safari for browsing a long time ago. Loopt, TypePad mobile blogging, the Associated Press mobile news program in which you yourself can submit and read news, etc.- all of which are free for purchase from the App Store.
If you've already watched the iBand video, the program behind it is also exhibited.
Other games like Promac Rally however, seems like it's gonna be really bad because based from my experience with Mario Kart Wii motion-steering, it's gonna be too imprecise.
One of the more promising apps however, is the medical education program that will probably benefit a lot of nursing students called Modality. I don't know if it will cost you anything, but I think it's really looking good. Even better is the body mapping application from MIMVista which lets doctors view x-rays and CAT scans intuitively. And wow.
There is another game in particular that amazed me because of the amazing graphics and animation, but I forgot the name.
Wow, I guess the delay of the iPhone for worldwide release was probably for the best since they want to mature the phone software and features for more practical use- and money obviously.
Office and iWork iPhone 2.0 software has finally put support for Office and Apple iWork documents- and that's definitely what people have been waiting for. Another obvious thing they should've put in the iPhone was the Calculator in which when you put your phone on landscape, it becomes a scientific calculator; contact searching, and the moving and multiple deletion of messages.
Gearing up for Asia Asia is finally getting native languages for the iPhone, and like some Nokia phones and TCL phones before it, you can write the Chinese and Japanese characters.
Free The upgrade is free for existing iPhone users, but if you want it for the iPod touch, you should still have to pay 10 dollars because, obviously, the iPod touch is for music and videos- not the features above.
MobileMe And I thought the update was just for enterprise users.
MobileMe essentially has the same features as the Microsoft Exchange support- only without the need for Microsoft Exchange. That means you can get Blackberry-like features such as Push e-mail and calendar without having to work for a huge company or set up a so-called "Exchange server".
So for example, if you get an e-mail on Outlook or Mail, it gets pushed to your phone like the famous BlackBerry. Or if your mom has changed the schedule in your iCal or Outlook calendar, it gets sent to your iPhone anytime, anywhere. The same goes for stored contacts: update them in the Address Book, update in the iPhone.
Me.com Me.com is now the replacement for Apple's .Mac service and will features Mail, Contacts, Calendar, Photo Gallery, and Online Hard Disk. It's a new web application both compatible for iPhone and the computer and will feature drag-and-drop features, and a fancy-pants interface.
*STOP SCROLLING!!!*
And now... "It's almost the iPhone's 1st birthday. Let's take it to the new level." Jobs says. And here it is:
New features Most of the new features of this new iPhone will be the same as the features on the upcoming firmware upgrade. But if you didn't read the above details, here they are in a nutshell:
3G - This feature is obviously not available in the first iPhone, neither is it available in the upcoming update. You probably already what this actually is. If not, then let's just say that 3G is a mobile Internet connection that is significantly faster than 2G's GPRS. And if the phone has a camera on front, you can make video calls to another 3G phone. The iPhone doesn't have a front camera, however, so there is no video calling.
What Apple didn't mention however, is also the inclusion of 3.5G (or HSDPA), which is faster than both 3G and at some cases, DSL.
Calculator - The iPhone finally gets a Calculator- and if you put it in landscape mode by tilting the phone horizontally, it becomes a scientific calculator! Pretty neat way to switch, to be honest.
Asian language support - With support for more than 20 Asian languages, with a lot of emphasis on Chinese and Japanese as well, you can now jot down characters on the screen or use the keyboard.
Third-party Applications - You've probably already heard about the several Java applications made for other kinds of phones, or maybe you've downloaded some apps for your Palm as well. This phone is of course, no different. Deployment of the third-party apps however, will be in the form of Apple's on App Store- so you don't need to go to that Globe website to download some pretty cool games.
Better battery life - Apple managed to get more juice out of the system clocking it at 24 hours on Audio, 7 hours video, 5 hours 3G talk time, 300 hours standby time, 7 hours browsing time and 10 hours 2G talk time.
GPS - Track your location, or let the iPhone help you go to a desired destination with its built-in GPS. Now the iPhone can really compete with the Nokia N95!
Better audio - Apple has finally pledged to put in better audio output, so you can enjoy your music even more.
Enterprise features - Push e-mail, calendar and contacts enable the Crackberries to not miss their BlackBerrys as much. It uses the Microsoft Exchange server as well.
MobileMe - MobileMe is a 99 dollar service that replaces Apple's .Mac hard drive/media/web publishing service. It lets the iPhone update the same database of contacts, e-mail and calendar events wirelessly and quickly.
Office support - Businessmen can view their Office and iWork files right from the get-go!
Thinner What's surprising is that the 3G iPhone is very much thinner than its predecessor.
The last time I checked as to why 3G wasn't supported by the last iPhone, it was because "it would make the phone really bulky". That's why I'm surprised. But whatever.
What happened to the backside??? Personally, I like its plastic black back (although there is another color choice for the 16 GB model). But critics say that the plastic back is a sure magnet for smudges- like the iPods before it.
Back to normality Critics also hated its unconventional 2" headphones jack. This time, Apple amended this to the normal 3.5" headphone jack, so yay!
Still no video recording? WTF?! For some reason Apple doesn't want to put video recording in the iPhone. This was a gripe among the masses the last time, and it still is.
I wish... I hope Apple will immediately phase out the 8GB model, lower the price of the 16GB model by a hundred dollars, and put in a newer 32GB model! The screen would be put to waste if the memory can't hold 8 full-length movies!
Cost "And even though 90% of our customers love their iPhone, 56% of the people who didn't have iPhones said it was simply too expensive. So one of the things we should tackle- besides common requests like 3G, Enterprise, Third-party apps and International support- is cost."
And what a price cut Apple did.
If you didn't already buy a hacked iPhone, it would probably be more sulit if you bought the 3G iPhone. Why? Well, the price has been cut from 399 USD to 199 USD- which is about 8000 pesos without the tax. Wow, you can say that it can even rival the famous Nokia music phones because of the bang-for-your-buck!
Globe Telecom Only Globe has the authorized access to sell the iPhones locally. Yes, locally as it will be sold here finally. Of course, it's the 3G iPhone! Otherwise, everyone will hate Apple!
Release date Apple plans to get things going on July 11th- which is the release date for 22 countries. After a later time, it will be released in all of the other 48 countries- including the Philippines. Officially, the price worldwide will also be 199 dollars for the 8GB version and 299 dollars for the 16GB version, and Apple will not allow the price to be higher than that exact amount- or so Steve Jobs says.
Finally... The iPhone is finally a competent contender in the smartphone arena, as it boasts a lot of very welcome features and viable adjustments, as well as some pricing perks, to finally make it worth buying! No really, I want it myself because I personally think that it's a worthy upgrade to my Sony Ericsson W800i, although knowing me, it's a bit hard to be letting go of the video recording.
But then again, that's what my Cybershot is for!
EDIT: Commercial And oh, I forgot. Here's a mildly funny commercial that Steve Jobs played twice in a row during the keynote. :D
In the past, I've always raved about how amazing Apple's MacBook and MacBook Pro is. And although I've never actually cared for Apple's past power upgrades, this one is actually something to care about. Why? Because not only did they add a lot more oomph to the two models' speed, or add more hard disk space, they included something that customers will really love- a Multi-touch mousepad.
But wait, I'm getting a bit ahead of myself. That last one is only applicable for MacBook Pro, but that upgrade is hella sweet. First introduced in MacBook Air, the Multi-touch mousepad uses the same touch screen technology in the iPod touch and iPhone, and take note that the only products you'll ever find these technologies are in Apple products (and maybe the Microsoft Surface as well). As I've raved before in the MacBook Air hands-on post, I loved working with photos using that pad and I practically, instantly missed it when I came back home. And frankly, maybe Apple realized that the MacBook Air won't be very hot after all, and it was a smart move to actually put it in MacBook Pro. Now, the Pro really distances itself from its other brother, the MacBook, and especially blazes it with even faster processing power (2.4Ghz and 2.6Ghz options) and actually usable graphics (nVidia GeForce 8600M GT with 256 or 512 MB memory to be specific).
*UPDATE: Wait a sec, so tapping the trackpad to do a click is already one of them multi-touch gestures? Then the MacBook Pro with Multi-touch models must already be here in the Philippines, because that happened when I tried out the MacBook Pro last Sunday!
And though the newer MacBook isn't really as post-worthy as the new addition in MacBook Pro's arsenal, the choice of having even faster speeds (2.0Ghz and 2.4Ghz for the tech-savvy) is a plus, as well as having 2GB of expandable RAM standard. Plus, you also get to only choose between 120-160GB hard drives, and if you'd like to burn more cash, why not get the fancier black MacBook with 250GB hard drive and faster everything?
Panic! At The Disco? Daughtry? Fall Out Boy? Wait, I never knew they'd potentially sound good alongside something like "I'm Yours"!
If you hate Genius though, I won't blame you. It's very much new, so if you give it enough time, and if a lot more people use it, the system will become smarter. It's still off to a great start regardless.
If you're a Mac user, you'll notice that the design is reminiscent to that of iPhoto. And if an artist has, say, 2 or 3 albums, you can look at them by pulling the mouse cursor up or down, left or right. To play the whole album or artist, you can just click the "Play Album" button that appears when you hover your mouse over it. You can resize the size of each album cover (and the captions underneath them) if you're blind, and you can sort them by Artist, Genres, Composers and Albums.
But as I said: I don't think anyone would be using this very often. Especially since it's a...
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